Shinobi's Best Friends
by BC
Summary: Sequel to Trust Your Nose. Bits and pieces from early canon, re-imagined. Naruto grew up as an adopted member of a Pack of ninken. He has a different perspective on the world – and he has learnt to trust his nose.
1. Becoming a Shinobi

Summary: Bits and pieces from early canon, re-imagined. Naruto grew up as an adopted member of a Pack of ninken. He has a different perspective on the world – and he has learnt to trust his nose.

Warnings: I don't feel like writing a future story for this verse, but bits and pieces dripped out of my brain anyway, so here they are. TWT, AU, a little bit of hinted shounen-ai here and there but nothing explicit, very little continuity or storyline, mostly just some really good bits of alt-canon that you seemed to want to read. Switching POV with unreliable narrators all around. And, in deference to canon, some violence and minor character deaths.

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto. I don't get money for writing fanfiction.

A/N: Fun fact: I imagine Shiriyuusu-sama as a Pyrenean mountain dog.

x

Chapter One: Becoming a Shinobi

x

"Naruto," Kana-san said quietly, with an odd tension in her shoulders, "if they don't let you become a ninja, you will come to our land and live with our Pack."

"Is that… is that even possible?" Naruto couldn't really imagine it – leaving Konoha behind and going to a place where everyone was a dog, but where all the dogs were his family and treated him like it. It sounded like a really weird dream. Neat, but really weird.

"It hasn't been done before," Kana-san admitted, "but then, we never had a summoner who wasn't a ninja. You are a precedent. And we would all rather see you happy among those who appreciate you."

Naruto hugged her. He wondered if he should start calling her 'Mum' one of these days, but he thought that wouldn't really be fair to Juuji and Annai. They were Pack, and Kana-san was Kana-san, and Naruto was a human. Most days he would prefer to be a dog, but he didn't need to.

He was happy anyway.

Okay, he was not happy right now – damn _Bunshin Jutsu_ , grrr, what kind of ninja would even use that cheap trick? – but once the sting of failing the Exams for the third time would pass, he was sure the happiness would come back.

"Thank you…" he said, patting Kana-san's paw. "But I'm not giving up yet."

After all, Mizuki had given him a mission. He was lying – Naruto knew to trust his nose – but he had offered Naruto the perfect opportunity to expose the kind of poohead he was. Maybe that wouldn't be worth a hitai-ate in the Old Man's eyes, but Naruto hoped it would at least be worth a review of his results.

x

Naruto's nose picked up on two people coming to him from the direction of the village center. He rolled up the Scroll and fastened it to his back. He had sort-of hoped that this would, against all odds, help him graduate, but going by the way Mizuki-sensei had hated him since day one, and the waves of excitement and glee that wafted from him today after the test, he hadn't counted on it.

In the end, it turned out profitable. At least now he could make a clone. In six months, that hitai-ate was his. The Old Man would have to let Naruto have another try, after he had decided to ignore Naruto's second attempt at graduation – which he had to do, or else he would have had to retire half of the Academy teachers on the spot. With a kunai.

"There you are, Naruto!" Mizuki called out, and then things went crazy for a while.

 _Shinobi_ crazy.

Naruto pulled out all his pranking experience and managed to evade Mizuki-bastard completely.

And then, just to prove that he was a bigger poohead than anyone would have guessed, the bastard picked up a fuuma shuriken and made the mistake of his life.

Naruto struggled to collect his jaw from the grass.

"Holy tailwag, Mizuki-sensei! Did you really just attack Iruka-sensei?" The teacher had dodged the heavy-handed blow, of course, but in this case it was definitely the thought that counted. "His boyfriend will kick your arse so bad. And then some."

"His _what_?!"

Iruka-sensei rubbed the back of his neck. "M-my… heh… heheh… Naruto, stop making up stuff."

"Are you queer, Iruka?" Mizuki jeered. "Is _that_ why you can't seem to keep your damn nose _out of my life_?!"

"Bullshit!" Naruto yelled before Iruka blew a gasket. The vein in Iruka's forehead was pulsing with alarming frequency. Naruto knew when to cower from it.

Mizuki, apparently, didn't. What an idiot. If he survived Iruka, he would have to deal with Iruka's boyfriend, and that guy had to be made of awesome judging by the way Iruka-sensei was gone on him. Iruka-sensei was pretty awesome himself, so that guy had to be something totally else.

There wouldn't be enough of Mizuki left to fill a matchbox.

"You could have just asked," Mizuki oozed with a slimy smirk. "I'm not into it, but I'd have let you down easy-"

"Not if you were the last man in the Land of Fire," Iruka-sensei muttered under his breath, but Naruto had good ears.

Bastard Mizuki laughed it off. "Ha! Naruto, want to know why everyone hates you?"

Fifteen minutes later Naruto was looking down at the twitching body of his former teacher and wondering if killing him would be considered an act of vengeance or an unwarranted mercy. If Iruka's boyfriend wasn't here yet, he was probably off on a mission… it would be sporting to leave this bastard at least a little bit alive… huh, _Hato_ -san from T&I would surely make a good enough job of it to satisfy any revenge fantasies… never mind then.

He bent down and ripped Mizuki's hitai-ate from his head. A traitor like that didn't deserve to wear Konoha's symbol.

"Naruto…" Iruka-sensei said quietly. His eyes moved from his ex-colleague to Naruto's face, and then to Naruto's hand. He nodded to himself. "Keep that. You've deserved it."

Naruto blinked. "But… you said I could only have one once I'm a ninja…?"

Iruka grinned. "That's right."

x

Rikku woke up to a scrabbling sound some time after midnight.

He blinked and turned around; Kana's claws found purchase in the ground and she braked just short of his porch. She stank of worry and rage.

Kana stank of worry and rage often enough since Rikku came to know her better than just as the puppy Shiryuu was so damn proud of (not that the old mutt would say so out loud). The reasons for her worry and rage were not exactly varied.

"Naruto?" Rikku asked.

Kana jerked her head. A string of saliva hit the dirt path. "He said he was going to get the results of his Exam, but hasn't come back yet. I tried to track him, but someone set off a scent bomb at the Academy and-"

"I can go to him directly," Rikku filled in – and answered her implied question at the same time. "Catch a breath, Kana-kun. And go for a run once in a while. You're out of shape."

He pretended not to notice her flinch. Honestly, what was she expecting? Simply not being on active duty was no reason to let oneself go completely. Rikku had gone on runs even half-blind and officially retired. Nowadays he trained daily, driven by the knowledge that one day soon Naruto's survival might depend on Rikku's speed and stamina.

He wouldn't disappoint another hunt-mate.

He crouched.

He activated the seal.

Arriving on top of the Hokage Mountain was a bit of a surprise; Rikku found immediately that aside from Naruto the only presence was that one ex-ANBU that either had a serious stalking problem or suffered the fixed idea that ensuring Naruto's well-being was his solemn duty. The man now lurked just at the edge of smelling distance.

There were no enemies here.

Naruto wasn't injured. He smelled very upset, but also proud and happy, and the cocktail of emotion was enough to make Rikku a little dizzy.

" _I'll eat you all! Grrr_!" yelled Naruto's voice, in a ridiculously melodramatic faux-ominous tone.

Rikku huffed a laugh. Then he spotted the boy and abruptly stopped laughing.

Naruto had Henge'd – no, that was not a Henge, it was one of his weird _physical_ transformations – into a shape that made even Rikku's hackles rise. The body itself resembled a fox, although it was roughly human sized… unless one added the abundance of flowing tails behind it.

"For Inari's sake…" Rikku grumbled. He had known that this moment would come sooner or later. At least, he assumed that this was Naruto's reaction to finding out about the demon sealed within him. Could _this_ be the result of anything else?

Rikku had attempted to steel himself for various possible reactions, and in the end was wholly unsurprised that Naruto reacted in a way Rikku couldn't have predicted even on magic mushrooms.

"Rikku!" Naruto exclaimed, raising himself on his hind-legs like a squirrel rather than a fox. "I have the best idea for a prank on the villagers!"

Yes, Rikku could see that. The faces of those morons down below them would have been memorable. On the other hand, the prank would end with Naruto in the morgue, so that was a no go.

"You do realise that those people fear and hate the Nine-tails?" he pointed out.

That wiped fox-Naruto's smile off his face. Not that the smile had been anything but a mask in the first place. "I know. Even Iruka-sensei gets all sad and angry. I guess this falls under Ya-san's rule of femur."

Rikku tilted his head, curious. "…what rule is that?"

Naruto grinned brightly – baring a lot of sharp fox-like teeth in his maw before he released the transformation and turned into a boy in a washed-out orange t-shirt again. "Making people feel the way they do when I bite them is not nice, and should be reserved for those that really deserve it," he announced proudly.

Yes, Rikku agreed, that did have Ya's paw-prints all over it.

"So," Naruto continued, taking tiny, shy steps forward, "you don't mind that I've got a demon sealed in me?"

Rikku, honest-to-Inari, rolled his eye.

Naruto threw himself onto the ground next to Rikku, grabbed clumps of his fur and burst into loud bawls.

Rikku nodded to himself and settled down to wait it out. This part of Naruto's reaction proceeded exactly as expected.

x

"Kana-san! Kana-san!" echoed from the corridor.

Finally, Kana thought. At least he's alright.

The door to Naruto's apartment burst open and slammed into the wall. Naruto stood on the doorstep, breathing hard, smelling sweaty but excited.

Kana looked up from the stack of homework she should have been correcting (her focus was _shot_ ), eyes narrowed with suspicion. Ya had snooped out that Naruto had failed to graduate yesterday, so he shouldn't have been that happy. Unless, of course, the waste heap that was the Academy had caught on fire with all the teachers except Umino-san still inside.

"What is it, Naruto-kun?" she asked, forcing herself to remain calm.

He lifted his hand and shook it, showing off his price. "I got a hitai-ate! I am a ninja!"

Kana's heart skipped a beat.

For a moment she didn't believe it. Oh, she didn't think Naruto was lying to her – she knew the pup far too well to be taken in by his fibs – but she was firmly convinced that someone had lied to Naruto. Probably that pool of catpee that went by _Mizuki_. This fear was further compounded by the stink of Mizuki that was left behind on the forehead protector.

But then, Naruto himself carried the fainter odours of blood and Umino Iruka under the stronger ones of tears and Rikku-san; Kana was inclined to at least entertain the idea that someone had finally gotten fed up with the atrocities committed on Naruto and decided to take matters into his own hands.

"Congratulations, Naruto-kun," she said, and promised herself that she and Ya would make sure Umino would get what he deserved – whether that would be a reward or a retribution. "We will have your Presentation the day after tomorrow."

"Eh? _Presentation_? What do I present? Or, oh, is it about getting presents? I like presents!"

"You will be the one presented," Kana explained, valiantly suppressing a sigh. It had been a long day, but it had been longer yet for Naruto, and he had done nothing that deserved a short-tempered response (that she knew of).

Naruto visibly deflated. He shuffled in and closed the door behind him.

"Like… to somebody else? You're giving me away?" His lower lip wobbled. "Can you even do that with people?"

Do not sigh, Kana reminded herself. Do not – he genuinely just does not understand. "Theoretically," she said, "but then it's called slavery, and it's a bad thing. No, Naruto-kun, no one is giving you away. We are introducing you to the rest of our Pack. In two days, all dogs from our valley will know you."

x

Naruto hadn't quite mastered the _Shunshin_ yet, and he definitely wouldn't have been able to _cross dimensions_ on his own, so he hitched a ride on Ya-san's back. Not literally – he was a little too big for that nowadays, and definitely too heavy – but he had sort of glomped onto Ya-san and let himself be dragged through the swirl of chakra.

They appeared on soft, green grass. Kana-san, Juuji and Annai were waiting for them, with another smaller dog that was definitely family – she looked completely like them, floofy off-white like Ya-san, but with Kana-san's face.

Naruto had never even heard of any other family members, so he was stumped.

Kana-san stepped forward and licked his jaw. Then she turned to the new dog. "Naruto-kun, this is Chou. She is Annai's twin."

"Hi, Chou-chan," Naruto said politely. "You've got a pretty bow there." It was blue and a little glittery in the sunlight. It looked really good on her.

The little girl-dog turned to Kana and growled. "I don't like him. He _smells_."

Naruto let his smile fall, but he didn't much take the comment to heart. All sorts of people disliked him before they even met him, and if he let every rejection bother him, he would never stop crying.

"He smells like a human, dear," Ya-san said with infinite patience.

Chou huffed and ostentatiously flounced away, swinging her bushy tail as if trying to blow Naruto far away from her.

Kana-san sighed.

Ya-san disentangled himself, stood closer to Naruto and quietly explained: "Chou did not wish to be trained as a ninken. She does not get summoned, and has only met a human once before. I doubt she remembers it, though – she was very little."

"She reminds me of Sakura," Naruto muttered back. Only, he had to admit, Sakura at least graduated the Shinobi Academy. Chou was more like Ruri, who had given up and gone back to civilian school, but still met up with the girls for Sasuke-watching.

"Sometimes I feel we shelter her too much," admitted Ya-san, "but it was her choice. We try to respect it."

Naruto didn't understand how anyone could not want to be a ninja. He also didn't want to make Kana-san or Ya-san mad, but most of his encounters with civilians hadn't gone well, and he still thought that it was weird that no one – not even Annai when she was a puppy – had ever talked about Chou, so in the end he just nodded and hoped that it was enough for an answer.

In any case, no one said anything more, and Naruto followed when they set out. Annai trotted along by his side, looking as excited as if it was her own Presentation. Naruto felt like his belly was full of butterflies, and sort of maybe wished he could skip the whole thing, but then he touched the steel plate of the hitai-ate covering his forehead and decided that it was definitely worth it.

He was, finally, a _real_ ninja.

x

The Presentation ceremony was held in a natural amphitheatre wide enough to comfortably seat the entire Pack. Attendees sat on grassy slopes grouped by immediate family or cliques of hunt-mates.

A Presentation was only ever tense for the newly minted ninja, so the atmosphere remained relaxed. Most of the audience took the opportunity to have a picnic. No one cared to even try quieting the smaller puppies.

Naruto-kun was practically jumping up and down by Kana's side, trying to take in everything at once, too busy soaking it all up to even babble.

"So…" spoke a voice that could be heard all across the amphitheatre despite not being raised at all, "…this is him."

Kana drew herself a couple of inches taller and met the eye of their leader. "Yes, Otou-sama. This is Uzumaki Naruto-kun, friend to my family and partner to Rikku. Naruto, meet the honourable Shiriyuusu-sama."

"Hello!" Naruto called out, nervous but excited at the same time. His original fright had transformed into awe, and he ceased staring at the rows of dogs surrounding the little arena because he was too preoccupied with gaping at the Honourable Head of the Pack. "It's nice you meetcha, _'ttebayo_!"

Mostly shielded behind the unflappable Ya, Kana put her paw over her eyes. Only her adopted pup.

"I see," Kana's Otou-sama replied once his original startle abated and left behind wary amusement. Outwardly he seemed displeased, perhaps even irritated, but Kana had known him for too long to fall for his bark. "You wish to be a member of this Pack, Uzumaki Naruto?"

Naruto's face scrunched up. "I thought I already was?"

Kana added another paw and a soft whine, falling quiet when Ya nudged her shoulder with his.

The Honourable Head didn't reply. He instead turned to Naruto's companion. "Do you wish to take this human as your partner, Rikku?"

Rikku gave a single affirmative bark and went back to staring at the mockingbirds in the trees.

Most of those present knew it was all a show, that of course Naruto was a member of the Pack and of course Rikku wasn't going to abandon him, but traditions were important.

In a few years, Naruto too would look back and laugh.

Kana's Otou-sama grumbled. He made a show of stepping closer, sniffing Naruto and looking him up-and-down, as if he had not received regular reports about the human pup from Kana for _years_. Finally, once Naruto was beginning to vibrate with restrained energy, he grinned.

"Welcome to the Pack, Naruto-kun."


	2. Cats and Dogs

A/N: Thank you for the response! I am glad to see that there is still interest in this AU. Since there have been questions, I can promise you that _Shinobi's Best Friends_ is already written and will be updated regularly about once a week. It has eight chapters.

x

Chapter Two: Cats and Dogs

x

Naruto was confused. His eyes and ears were telling him that this guy was a total bastard, and a lame one at that, but his nose had been telling him for years that the guy with this smell was awesome. It had gotten to the point that Dog's awesomeness was just a fact of life.

So, obviously, Dog was lying. And he wasn't Dog now, but Kakashi-sensei.

Okay, Naruto could work with that. The doggy part of him kind of wanted to go press his nose into that guy's stomach and get his hair rubbed, but that would not be discreet, and after Kana-san's many, _many_ lectures on the topic, he knew _all_ about discretion-

-as opposed to Uchiha Sasuke, who couldn't see the forest for the tree planted right in front of his nose, and Haruno Sakura, who didn't even smell good anymore since she had started putting on tons of the perfume stuff that was supposed to attract Sasuke to her. Honestly, if Sasuke had a nose tenth part as good as Naruto's he was repulsed, not attracted. Sakura could probably write down the textbook definition of discretion, and then in the next moment forget that such a thing even existed, because Sasuke would walk by or pick his nose in a very cool way or pass a manly wind.

Then, finally, it was Naruto's turn to introduce himself. "My name is Uzumaki Naruto," he said. "I like dogs!" It was true, but he made it a point to keep mum about _ninken_ and contracts and adopted packs. "And ramen! I hate the three minutes it takes for instant ramen to be ready to eat!" He thought for a while, and then shrugged. "…kinda not too fond of cats."

Naruto didn't like the way Kakashi-sensei's face rearranged itself under the mask. Even if he couldn't tell unholy glee by sight, he could smell it clearly. He shouldn't have said that.

He was going to regret saying that very much.

"And your dream?" Kakashi-sensei prodded.

Naruto pouted. " _It's not a dream_ … _more of an ambition_ …" he mocked over-exaggeratedly, glancing side-ways to Sakura and ready to dodge if she attacked. But, no, she was drooling over the Lamppost, no brain-cells left over to listen, so all was good on the pink front.

The Lamppost himself looked even more constipated, which was actually probably really dangerous – could you rupture an intestine that way? – but Naruto bravely ploughed on anyway, saying the obvious thing rather than the true one: "…I'm prolly gonna be the Hokage."

"Idiot!" Sakura yelled.

Naruto suspected he could have said any combination of syllables and get the same reaction, so he shook it off… like a flea.

Which was… kinda funny. Heh. Sakura the Flea. He was going to keep that one for the future.

"Che." Lamppost had nothing to say, but made himself heard anyway, probably afraid that otherwise everyone – except the Flea – would forget that he was there.

Naruto listened to the instructions Kakashi-sensei gave them with a bated nose – the jounin was full of crud, but he was kind of crafty at sticking together pieces of truth and pieces of lies, so in the end Naruto _knew_ that not all the instructions were good, but he was completely stumped when it came to figuring out the good bits from the cruddy ones.

The Lamppost and the Flea hung onto Kakashi-sensei's every word. That, Naruto mused, came from being used to trusting their teachers. _That_ happened to kids who _could_ trust their teachers.

Naruto was, almost, a little bit, glad that he never could trust anyone at the Academy, with maybe the exception of Iruka-sensei – and even that was only conditional and excluded any topic even remotely related to pranks. Naruto had learnt better the second time Iruka-sensei pranked someone and acted innocent, so Naruto got the blame.

Still, Iruka-sensei never let Naruto be punished if there wasn't proof, and when Iruka-sensei was the actual prankster there obviously wasn't any proof.

Naruto tentatively accepted Iruka-sensei as a person who wouldn't hurt him.

He had been very surprised – and touched – when Iruka-sensei actually went beyond that and actively protected Naruto, risking his life in the process.

"Dismissed," said Kakashi-sensei.

Sasuke was gone within a blink of an eye, presenting his textbook perfect form as he jumped off the roof and landed on the footpath. He walked away without as much as a backwards glance.

Sakura squealed – Naruto clapped his hands over his ears half a second too late, and glared at the back of her pink head – and hurried to the roof door in the vain hope that she might catch up to the Uchiha if she _jogged_.

When Naruto let his hands down again, Kakashi-sensei was staring at him. He didn't seem annoyed, just curious.

"You smell like an Inuzuka," he remarked.

Naruto looked down at himself. He was sure he smelled. He was sure he smelled like a lot of things, few of them pleasant to the nose.

But he knew that Kakashi-sensei wasn't talking about the _right now_ smell. He was talking about the _in general_ smell. And _in general_ Naruto still didn't smell like Kiba at all (maybe a little bit like Aka-chan, but that was because he and Aka-chan were partners in pranking).

"Wrong," he said and, just before he took a leap off the edge, he added: "I smell like _dogs_. But then, so do you, Kakashi-sensei."

As opposed to his teammates, he went home over the roofs – like an actual shinobi.

x

Naruto's teammates abandoned him tied to the post.

He waited. Not for very long, because he still wasn't good at being patient, but he gave it an honest try, if only so Kana-san wouldn't scold him later.

He was about ready to start digging out a splinter from the wood to open a wound for summoning, when Kakashi-sensei puffed back onto the scene and freed Naruto, taking a quick look at his wrists to make sure they weren't really hurt. It was so nice of him that it actually gave Naruto a pause.

So, Dog was still Dog under that weird grey hair and stupid face-mask. He was just undercover as this Kakashi-person.

"You asked them to work with you," said Kakashi-sensei.

"Well… yeah. You're kinda… _big_." What Naruto meant was that Kakashi-sensei was a jounin, and even though Naruto would one day get to the point that he would be totally able to wipe the ground with a single jounin before breakfast, he wasn't quite there yet. Just a little way to go, but still, it was always better to have back-up.

Not that Sakura was useful for anything except maybe making people's eyes water with the stink of her perfume, but Sasuke was flashy and wore bright colours and seemed to be doing his best to grow up to be a walking distraction. So far his special, special powers only worked on the fangirls, but Naruto would have been willing to at least try them on Dog.

"…alright, that's fair," decided Kakashi-sensei.

"'course," Naruto continued, shrugging philosophically, "they wouldn't work with me. Sasuke has his head up his butt. Sakura also has her head up Sasuke's butt. I mean, just looking at those tiny shorts you wouldn't say that two heads would fit up there, but obviously they somehow manage. And that's not even talking about Ino, and the other fangirls and the teachers at the Academy and the Council…." He paused and blinked a few times. A horrifying realisation dawned on him. "Wow, now that I think about it, it totally makes sense that he's grumpy. Living with a whole village inside your butt must be painful." He grimaced and his hands strayed protectively to the seat of his pants.

This was what he got for having an overactive imagination – and it was at least a little bit his sensei's fault, because even a clone's memory of the Thousand Years of Pain Jutsu stung like… well, like a chakra-powered poke in the butt. And that was just one person, and he wasn't even trying to climb in there head-first.

"Naruto…" Kakashi sighed in a way that made it clear how much he wanted to palm his face in exasperation. But, and this Naruto considered a lot more important, he _didn't argue the point_.

x

Naruto narrowed his eyes and stuck out the tip of his tongue. "Let me get this straight…"

"Oh, kami," Sakura sighed woefully, "the idiot strikes again-"

"…I get paid to chase cats."

Kakashi-sensei seemed to contemplate the question seriously for quite some time (although Naruto was pretty sure that was just a stalling technique, because sensei didn't want anyone to notice that he was laughing on the inside). In the end, he tilted his head and squinted his one visible eye.

"Maa, Naruto-kun, it's just _one_ cat. And Tora might not really be the kind of cat you expect. And, anyway, the jounin-sensei gets paid first, and the gennin only get a percentage-"

"I _get paid_ to _chase cats_ ," Naruto restated.

"Idiot," opined either the Lamppost or the Flea. Their voices sounded really similar when they tried to talk quietly.

Kakashi shrugged. "If you want to think of it that way…" He pulled out his bright orange book.

Naruto took that to be a confirmation and grinned. It was shaping up to be a day full of vindictive play, and he was going to get rewarded for it at the end. He had thought being ninja was going to be a lot more hard work and a lot less fun.

x

Naruto and Naruto's Shadow Clones were mucking out a ditch.

It was dirty work, but it wasn't hard to do, and it always amused Naruto when he was fairly good at something Sasuke failed at resoundingly. It didn't happen often, and he had found that pointing out such an instance got both his teammates mad at him – then they tried to hit him, and mostly succeeded, and that kind of hurt – so he just crowed happily inside his head.

And maybe he grinned a bit. Just a little. To himself.

Sasuke grumbled, sitting on the curb of a nearby footpath. There weren't any words in the grumble. He was just like a cat (not like Tora, like a _normal_ housecat), making hissing and spitting sounds, and trying to get mud out of his poor hair.

It was a good thing Sasuke didn't have a longer tongue, Naruto thought, because he would have probably tried to lick his hair clean, and that was just _eww_.

Sakura went 'round with a spiky pole and stabbed big pieces of rubbish in the ditch, then pulled them out and placed them all on a pile. She struggled a bit, especially when the mud didn't want to let go and her hands slid on the shaft.

And Kakashi-sensei was leaning against a wall under an overhang across the street, reading his little baby-blue book full of baby-making stuff. Bleh.

"I've had it!" Sakura announced over the rumbling sound her guts made. "I'm cold, I'm wet – _I'm hungry_ – and I've mucked out half of Konoha's drainage system!"

She really didn't. Naruto had been down to the sewers and, boy, was Sakura in for a surprise if they ever caught a mission down there. It wouldn't be any time soon, though, because that was at least a C-rank, and they were firmly stuck in the D's.

"I'm going home! Sasuke-kun-"

"Hn," said Sasuke. He gingerly stuck his feet into his mud-encrusted sandals, stood up and stared toward the opposite side of the street at their jounin.

"Maa," said Kakashi-sensei, and Naruto could hear him clearly but his teammates probably didn't, because they walked over to him to listen. "Giving up already?"

"This isn't training!" Sakura hissed, "And it isn't a proper mission either! You're just getting your kicks out of seeing us humiliated!"

She and Sasuke put together weren't wearing half as much mud as Naruto was. They hadn't done half as much work either.

Naruto wasn't seeing the big problem with mud. The other stuff in the ditch was a little gross – dead animals and tossed food and he had actually found a severed human hand that he had considered just _handing_ to one of the princesses on his team. It would have given him a good laugh.

In the end he spent too long deciding which one of them would squeal more loudly, and Kakashi ended up stealing the hand and hiding it away.

"I suppose we could stop here for the day," Kakashi fake-mused. He shaded his eye with his hand as if to block out the sun, even though the sky was all dark grey. "It's going to get dark soon. Well, Naruto and I will finish here, and you two can go home, provided you stop by the Missions Desk."

"To report our progress?" Sakura inquired, excited about being picked for Team Seven's spokesperson.

"Uh, yeah," the jounin agreed, shrugging. "And to _hand_ this in for identification."

He pushed something into star-struck Sakura's hands and set out toward Naruto. He had come almost all the way over before Sakura actually looked down, realised what she was holding, and screamed.

Naruto and his five _Kage Bunshin_ sniggered.

Kakashi smelled like satisfaction and _schadenfreude_ (hard to recognise, harder to name, but Naruto had loved that word ever since Ya-san taught it to him).

Naruto forgave Kakashi-sensei for stealing the hand. Making Sakura carry it all the way to the Hokage Tower was better than just freaking her out with it.

Also, sending the princesses home meant that after Kakashi-sensei deducted his own share, the rest of the pay would be Naruto's.

Dinner at Ichiraku's!

x

It was a bright day. The birds were chirping, the flowers bloomed, the Old Man puffed on his pipe not too far away in his Old Man office, and Naruto had had a really good time sprawling all over his futon with Rikku and Juuji last night. No bad dreams.

He was ready to take the bad guys head-on and put the fear of Konoha into their hearts.

Barring that…

"Sensei, sensei! Can we get Tora again?"

"Maa…" Kakashi deliberately deliberated for a long time, even though the Hokage Tower was _right there_ and they just had to go in and talk to the ninja manning the Missions Desk. "Let's first see what's available."

"Tora! Please?" Naruto exclaimed as they entered the office, and then pouted for all he was worth. It wasn't a sure thing that Tora had escaped again – he failed about one out of four days – but the chances were good.

The chuunin behind the desk gaped at Naruto as if he was seeing an S-class Iwa Doton user coming at him with a bouquet of flowers. "I… have never seen a gennin _ask for_ the Tora mission. Not even Gai-san's gennin. Kakashi-san… I've got the form for psych eval requisition if you-"

"Maa… Naruto's just a little rambunctious. I'd notice if he wasn't sane enough." Considering that he said this with his mask-covered nose buried in porn, in the middle of a bright day at the Missions Desk, the paperwork ninja's expression of mute terror maybe wasn't actually unwarranted.

Naruto stopped bouncing around and squinted at the guy, who paled further and then keeled over in a faint, because there suddenly wasn't enough blood in his brain.

"Idiot!" Sakura snarled habitually.

"This is awesome!" Naruto happily bounced over to the desk, pulled out a paper, initialed it in all the right places, scribbled a _henohenomoheji_ at the bottom and took off down the corridor. " _Tora-teme_! Here I come!"


	3. Real Life Monsters

A/N: Mood whiplash, I know. But this story is not (intentionally) crack, so seriousness happens, the way it does in _Trust Your Nose_.

This somehow unintentionally turned quite unkind to Sakura. I don't do character bashing, so I'll try to show in another point of view that this is simply Naruto's opinion, and it's far from objective, but I'm not sure if it's clear enough. So, for posterity, Sakura will kick arse, but she's still waiting for the kick _in the_ arse that would start her off, and without being blinded by a crush Naruto really doesn't like her at all. She literally _stinks_ to him. Moreover, her screeching deafens even me when I watch the anime (in Japanese, no other way to watch anime) and I've got plain old boring civilian human hearing.

x

Chapter Three: Real Life Monsters

x

"Naruto," Kana said slowly, winding her way along the wall of the room to avoid stepping on anything sharp, "it is a little late for a spring cleaning."

"I don't know what to pack!" Naruto cried, throwing up his hands.

He was sitting on his haunches in the middle of the room, surrounded on all sides by a spread made up of all his ninja supplies. There were kunai and senbon and shuriken; there were explosive, smoke and stun tags; there were sealing scrolls and a basic medical kit and spools of ninja wire that he still couldn't use as anything but an improvised garrote.

"I've sealed two weeks' worth of field rations," he said, lifting a scroll in each hand. He placed those at the bottom of his pack, forlornly looking at the limited space.

"Training trip?" Kana inquired.

Naruto bounced on his knees. "A mission! A real one, not just chores in the village! A real C-rank!"

Kana fervently hoped that Kakashi-san knew what he was doing. Naruto was a good boy, and in between Ya and herself they had drilled basic skills into him. Unfortunately, from what she had seen of the other two children during her covert observation of the D-rank missions, there was no team to speak of.

She had only a vague idea of Sasuke-kun's and Sakura-kun's skills, because Kakashi-san did not spend any time providing training. He did not explain the versatile uses of chakra, or teach ninjutsu – or even supervise sparring.

Kana had spoken with Pakkun, and they were monitoring the situation. Pakkun trusted his human hunt-mate, and Kana respected the man, but she had learnt the hard way that even good people turned rotten around her adopted human.

"Kana-san?" Naruto asked in a voice trembling with dismay. "Did something bad happen?"

She braved the expanse of the floor and crossed to room to the boy. She licked his face. He tried to squirm away and pretended disgust, but the happiness leaked back into his expression.

"I have every confidence in you, Naruto-kun," she said, and perhaps it wasn't entirely the truth, but it wasn't as far off as to be a lie.

His beaming grin lit up the room.

"You'll help me pack, right? I've got no idea what I'll need..." He bit his lip and surveyed the chaos around them.

"Start with weapons," Kana suggested, picking out the best kunai from what she found with surprise weren't training ground spoils anymore.

Tags would be next.

And then…

Kana supposed this was more complicated for human ninja than for ninken. There was the underwear issue that she hoped Naruto would manage by himself, because her experience was… well… nonexistent.

x

It was a bright day. The birds were chirping, the flowers bloomed, the team was walking down the dirt road at snail's pace to accommodate their client's hungover amble, and Naruto smelled something fishy.

Not actually _fishy_ , more watery and mucky, and maybe a little swampy. He hadn't smelled anything like it before, and he didn't like it.

"Ne, Kakashi-sensei?" he spoke up, and with ease of practice ignored how the lilt of Sakura's monologue changed from gushing about her future career as kunoichi to complaining about being held back by the dropout.

Kakashi-sensei's eye strayed from the forest he was watching behind the cover of his adult book to Naruto. "Huh?"

"Can I do a little jutsu?" Naruto whined. He knew he sounded obnoxious, but that was on purpose, and Dog's eye narrowed in thought. "I've gotta train if I want to become Hokage!" he added.

"As if you could do anything but that perverted technique!" Sakura spat, flushed.

Kakashi-sensei looked back to the forest. He shrugged. "Don't set the woods on fire, okay?" He sounded like he could not care less even if Naruto did set something on fire, as long as it wasn't his book.

Naruto wasn't very good at listening, but Ya-san was a great teacher, and Naruto tried. He really did. So he nodded to Dog-sensei, because the jutsu he wanted to do wasn't fire anyway.

He slowed down to fall back behind Kakashi-sensei… actually, passing by him and getting a better sniff, it was just a shadow clone of Kakashi-sensei, and the actual Dog was either scouting forwards or, more likely, flanking the hunt, to make sure no one got at them from behind.

The Pack would have taught him that.

Naruto bit his finger. " _Kuchiyose no jutsu_ -"

With a _whump_ , Rikku was standing by Naruto's side. The ninken scowled and in a low growl asked: " _Ambush_?"

Naruto blinked. "Is that the swampy smell?"

And then Kakashi-sensei's clone popped.

Rikku jumped forward. Naruto's body followed on its own, like it was trained to. They tag-teamed an enemy while Sasuke beat up another one and Sakura stared.

And Kakashi-sensei watched. Okay, coming down from the sudden battle-haze, Naruto figured out that Kakashi-sensei was _evaluating_ , while making sure that he was covering their backs. It was okay – the enemy ninja weren't very strong.

"Uaaaa!"

Naruto raised his hands to cover his ears, but didn't finish the motion, remembering that he was still holding his kunai.

He wiped them and stashed them away, glaring at Sakura. What the hell was that for?

"A… a… a…" Sakura was pointing her trembling finger at Rikku. "A monster!"

Rikku did look properly fearsome as he was, pale fur stained with blood, especially around his maw. With his scarred face and side, he must have seemed right scary to someone who didn't know him.

Naruto shrugged. "They call me 'monster' all the time," and went on pretending that Sakura was pointing at him. He and Rikku were standing side by side, so it was almost believable.

Rikku didn't believe it. He huffed.

Naruto knew this was an amused sound, but Sakura and Tazuna both yelled and started backing away. Sakura even raised her kunai – far, far too late, but at least she remembered eventually that she was armed.

"Good job, partner," Rikku said quietly, looking from the dead body to Naruto. "If you need to talk about it… call me."

He unsummoned himself.

'About what?' Naruto almost asked. Then he looked at the dead body, and realised that he had made it that way. Rikku had helped him, but there was a gaping wound in the corpse's throat, and it had been definitely made with Naruto's kunai.

Huh.

x

Tazuna turned out to be a lying sack of poo, but he was a lying sack of poo trying to save his country, so they went forward with him.

Naruto didn't think Dog-san would do it. When Kakashi-sensei agreed, Naruto was sure there was some secret mission behind this one that would make the trip worth it anyway.

He wondered if he should just summon Rikku to walk with him all the time. He had more than enough chakra for it, and if Sakura freaked out again, then that was her problem. Kakashi hadn't said anything about the summoning, even when Sakura complained about being scared by 'one of Naruto's prank jutsu'.

Summoning Rikku sounded like a good idea.

"Ne, Kakashi-sensei!" he said, changing his voice to the whine he knew Dog-san would recognise as Naruto being a sneaky shinobi. "Can I-"

"Down!" Dog ordered.

Naruto flopped to his belly just in time to escape being cut in half.

x

Kakashi didn't enjoy their respite at Tsunami's house.

He hated being laid up, even if that wasn't too hard to hide from his so-called team.

What actually did give him a bit of a challenge was hiding how much he despised, _abhorred_ fucking up. And he had fucked up but royally. Honestly, going with Tazuna's half-arsed fabrication out of curiosity was well and good – the Hokage even managed to make it sound like a half-reasonable recon mission to Wave – but dragging three untrained, mostly useless gennin along was Mist levels of wasteful.

It was just stupid chance that they weren't dead already.

He needed…

 _Kuchiyose no Jutsu_ , he thought, estimating that his wounds were still leaking enough through the stitches that he didn't have to bleed from yet another spot.

His favourite ninken appeared in a modest puff of chakra, and orientated himself with a quick turn-around. Once he ascertained that there was no immediate danger, he took stock of Kakashi's injuries and opened his maw to berate him-

"Oh… Hi, Pakkun-san!" Naruto yelled from over by the water, where he was unknowingly inciting his teammate to murder by obliviously stomping all over his fragile ego.

Sasuke fell off the tree again.

Naruto, wet barely to his ankles, bounded over.

"Naruto-chan!" exclaimed Pakkun, and proceeded to lick the hyperactive blonde's face – just twice, but that was more open affection than Kakashi himself had received in years. "Are you one of Kakashi's gennin? Ha! Ungrateful wretch hasn't even summoned us to tell us the happy news…"

"How's Kana-san doing?" inquired the boy, exercise already forgotten.

Pakkun barked a chuckle. "Busy keeping the kids in line. But good. I've heard she was up for promotion."

"Meh," Naruto flopped his hand up and down, "she'll turn it down like she did the last five times. Wanna bet?"

Pakkun shook his head. "Sucker bet, kid."

Kakashi watched the exchange and swallowed down the redundant: 'So you and Pakkun know one another, huh?' He prided himself on being pretty smart. His continued survival was a fairly convincing argument, never mind the tiny little fact that he hadn't figured out until now that Naruto's 'prank monster' – as coined by Sakura – was not an Inuzuka-like animal transformation, but an actual _summon_! Inuzuka techniques from the kid would at least make sense, since he was friends with Kiba's ninken Akamaru.

What kind of Academy student even had _summons_?!

In any case, Kakashi was pretty smart, so he quickly put together the most likely course of events leading to this point.

There were few dog-summoners in Konoha. A couple remained among the Branch House of the Hyuuga (the Main House considered animals as common as dogs to be beneath their dignity and insisted on summoning their eagles and gazelles instead), so it was possible that Naruto had gotten a contract from them. But the only Hyuuga the boy knew was in his class, and she was the Heiress.

Could she have procured the contract for Naruto?

Possible but very, very unlikely.

It was far more likely that Naruto had stumbled upon it during one of those rare times when Kakashi had been forced to evacuate him from some would-be assassin and leave him in his apartment unsupervised.

Frowning, Kakashi watched Naruto and Pakkun yammer on about Pack gossip and wondered what else he had missed.

x

There was no Apothecary in Wave.

There weren't many shops left at all, and those that opened either had nothing to sell, or tried to sell at prices no one could afford.

It had been… not easy, but at least possible to tell themselves that it had nothing to do with them. That they were only here to do a job. But then his Master needed medicine, and there was no Apothecary in Wave.

Haku knelt and picked another thyme stem. He could make his own field medicine if pressed, but it did not match the potency of professionally prepared analgesics and muscle relaxants.

There was a corner of his mind that, try as he might, he could not surrender to Zabuza-san and his dream. It was filled with all those superfluous feelings, those hindering morals that kept Haku from truly becoming the tool he wished to be to repay Zabuza-san's kindness. In that corner he stowed the thought that perhaps they deserved this – deserved worse – when they fought for oppression of people, for poverty and hunger and slavery and mutilation. There was no dream behind this fight. There was just pure greed.

Means to an end, Zabuza-san had said.

Haku stood; he brushed twigs and leaves off of his knees, picked up his basket, and followed the footpath that led around the bridge builder's house. He walked that path every day, in one direction in the morning and then returning in the late afternoon; no one had noticed him except to smile and greet him.

Don a cute kimono, and even demolished people would find a smile for you.

Don a cute kimono, and you can come to your enemies' doorstep to evaluate them day after day, and remain unnoticed. Even great shinobi-

"Oi, you there," said a growly voice.

Haku spun on his heel. Shock caused him to move faster than a civilian could and raise his free hand in a defensive gesture. He hadn't heard anyone. He hadn't sensed anyone!

"Yeah, you," said the same voice.

Haku's gaze travelled down. And down. There was a pug. In a blue vest. It was glaring very fiercely, but Haku couldn't find it in himself to be actually scared.

He let his hand down. Then he squatted and smiled. "Hello, little dog-san. How are you talking?"

Instead of letting himself be petted, the pug bared its teeth. "Very cute. Now, you can tell me what you were watching the kid for… or you can tell my friend."

Another dog walked out of the trees. This one didn't wear a vest. It was huge, and Haku stood up to regain the height advantage. He was beginning to feel nervous. He knew the sort of scars that signalled that his opponent was dangerous.

"Though," the pug continued with that terrible faux amiability of people who were able and willing to do great harm to you, "I'm worried you might not like talking to my friend."

The bigger dog lowered its head and looked up through shaggy brows. There was the barest glint of a fang from his mouth, but that was enough to convey the message.

"What k-kid?" Haku stammered. He used to stammer for a while when he was younger, so he could now do it believably. "I don't… don't understand. Dog-san."

The pug looked unimpressed. "Thing is, my friend and I have a bet. I think you're just following the kid around for recon before you and your nukenin friends come back to kill him and his team. My friend, though – he's got a suspicious mind. He thinks you're perving on the boy."

Haku felt himself flush with outrage. His spine straightened. One foot moved back, letting him subconsciously fall into a fighting stance. "How could that even occur to you?!" He glared at the huge ninken. "That's a _little_ boy!"

The pug glanced sideways at his companion. "See? I told you it was just regular espionage."

"You know-" said another voice-

Haku almost gave himself whiplash as he tried to locate the new speaker, whom he also didn't hear approach. He flickered to stand with his back to a tree. Not the safest place when confronting a _Leaf_ ninja, but safer than anything else in sight. The shore was too far away.

He let himself fall into a trap in a _forest_.

The basket with herbs fell to the ground. Haku held three senbon in one hand and readied the other for forming one-handed seals.

From somewhere in the canopy above him came: "I was so sure you were a girl."

A blond boy in a burnt orange t-shirt was sitting on one of the lower branches of an aspen. He grinned and swung his legs; his hands were both in sight, one idly holding a kunai, the other empty.

"Why would you even speak to me instead of killing me outright?" Haku demanded. If they tried to take him alive to interrogate him about Zabuza-san, he would rather kill himself now. If they were doing it for the sheer enjoyment of the game – well, then perhaps he had a chance to use their overconfidence against them and get away.

"You misunderstand, nukenin-san," said the little pug. "This is a warning. Go away and don't come back until you are ready to fight. If we see you before then, my friend will bite you. And he tends to bite off whole limbs."

"And you, shinobi-san?" Haku addressed the Konoha ninja sitting in the tree. "Are _you_ willing to let me leave?"

"I'm not even here," said the blond boy, and dispersed.

"A clone?" Haku breathed.

"Before you ask, I'm not here either," said an identical boy from a branch on Haku's left. "I think I'm actually asleep." He tilted his head to the side. "That's weird."

"Get a move on, nukenin-san," insisted the pug.

"I'll walk with you," announced the clone, and hopped down into the undergrowth. He picked up Haku's basket and set out. "Not all the way, just far enough to make sure you don't get lost _on the road of life_."

Haku, bewildered, fell into step with him, wary of the ninken at their heels. He still wasn't convinced they would genuinely let him go, but the clone (it was irksome that Haku couldn't even tell what kind of clone it was) would have only had a fraction of the shinobi's power, and he was confident enough to believe that the two dogs by themselves could not kill him.

"So, these plants," said the clone, peering into the basket, "whatcha need them for? Is it food? Poison?"

Haku considered keeping his mouth shut – only a fool revealed more than he had to – but if their intention to let him leave was genuine, perhaps it was worth it to offer a gesture of faith in turn. "Medicine."

"Huh."

After a while, something pained and angry crawled up from the discontent corner of Haku's mind and out of his mouth: "Did you know there's no Apothecary in Wave?"

The clone looked at him through a pair of sky-blue eyes. He solemnly nodded. "I don't know anything about economy – you'd have to ask Sakura – but I think the bastard Gato's not going to own this country for long."

Haku agreed. He wasn't sure if he was allowed to agree, but that didn't stop the vision of corpses strung up at squares and a far too familiar look in the eyes of the street rats digging through rubbish. As if anyone had food to throw out. "But by that time, will there be anything left here?"

"I don't want to fight you," said the blond.

Haku's chest hurt. "I don't want to fight you either," he admitted. But his rebellious want would be squashed under the weight of his duty and discipline. "And when I do-"

"You'll die," said the pug from behind.

"That may be," Haku agreed. "But it may not. I will continue to serve Zabuza-san to the best of my abilities for as long as I am worth anything to him."

The clone stopped. He mulled over something for a while, ignoring the quizzical grumbles from his canine companions. Then he stretched out his hand toward Haku.

"I guess you've watched us enough to know our names, but I kinda want to do this. Sorry for not being the original, that's kinda impolite, I guess, but, hey – I'm Naruto."

It was as though Haku watched himself do it, a little incredulous, a little angry with himself. He stretched out his hand, gripped Naruto's and squeezed his fingers, careful to not do it hard enough to pop the clone.

"Haku," he said. He still, even after touching it, didn't know what kind of clone it was. "Too bad Naruto-san won't remember this," he pointed out.

It was going to make the fight somewhat easier, though.

The clone nodded and rubbed the back of his head. "Yeah, too bad. He, he."

"Naruto-chan," growled the pug. Then he sniffed in Haku's direction. "Get walking, nukenin-san. Don't make me remind you a third time."

Haku took his basket from the clone's hand and set out. Once he was far enough away, he looked over his shoulder and said simply: "See you later, Naruto-san."


	4. Friends and Family

A/N: Dear readers, thank you for your response to this story. You have returned my faith in my own writing. Cheers,

Brynn

x

Chapter Four: Friends and Family

x

Pakkun slipped on blood.

The whole bridge was stinky and sticky and slippery.

He was a ninken, so there weren't any embarrassing nosedives; he adjusted his stance and walked on, casting a sideways glance at his human hunt mate.

Kakashi set the dying nukenin down onto the blood-slick stonework next to the already dead nukenin and stepped away, casting about for something to do. There wasn't anything. The fight was over. The mercenaries were gone; the civilians were busy congratulating themselves. Kakashi's kids were banged up but okay, in no small part because Naruto-chan had made enough of an impression on ice boy that ice boy refused to kill.

Soft-hearted. Dead for it.

And with the kind of back-story that struck especially hard. Not just Naruto-chan, but also the little Uchiha and Kakashi himself – all three empathised with the nukenin.

"That's a bad one," said Guruko, pausing for a moment by Pakkun's side to watch Kakashi with a mixture of worry and disdain.

Pakkun nodded. "Not as bad as that time with Obito-chan, or that time with Rin-chan, or that time with Minato-san or-"

"Yeah, yeah," Guruko grumbled and unsummoned himself to get away from all the icky emotionality and the icky stickiness under their paws.

-or that time Jiraiya-san kidnapped Kakashi and made him think they were going to hurt his mate, Pakkun finished his thought.

This was a bad day, but small biscuits compared to some other days.

x

After the thing with Haku happened, Naruto was sad.

He was sadder than he could remember ever being. It made little sense – he barely knew Haku… but that was a lie, wasn't it? He had known Haku for such a short time, but known him far too well. _The feeling that you are not needed by anyone in the world_ … Naruto felt like someone had scooped out his insides and only returned a half of them, and even those weren't put back in the right places. Everything hurt.

His eyes wanted to water all the time, and that was really inconvenient, because his nose got blocked up, and then he couldn't smell a thing.

After a day of Naruto not babbling at all – he honestly hadn't felt like talking – Kakashi-sensei took him aside and ordered him to summon one of his ninken. And Naruto had his thumb bleeding, hand seals set, mouth open-

-when he realised that he didn't want Rikku here, not now. Or, no, of course he did want Rikku here. But he was afraid that his hurt would remind Rikku of Rikku's hurt, and he never ever wanted to open Rikku's scars. They looked too painful.

So, instead, he called for his brother in all but species.

Juuji fell onto his haunches, preemptively growled at Kakashi-sensei and jumped up at Naruto, who barely managed to brace himself and not let the shove carry both him and his niisan to the ground.

"Oh darn fleacakes – what happened to you, Sunface?"

Naruto wanted to grin and shrug it off, but in the end his arms somehow locked around his dog-brother and kept him prisoner in a hug while Naruto sniffled into Juuji's overlong fur.

Kakashi-sensei shuffled in a way that hinted that he was about to say something, but then he didn't say anything. He moved on to catch up with Sakura and Sasuke, giving nary a glance to the forest on either side of the path.

Naruto would have bet a paw – a _hand_ – that this time Kakashi-sensei had a shadow clone prowling behind the team as a flank-guard.

"Sad," Naruto admitted into Juuji's fur, and then let go and climbed up to his feet.

"So," the dog glanced at him side-ways, smelling very suspicious, "you called me 'cause I'm supposed to be your confidante?"

Naruto, by now wise to Juuji's sarcasm, gaped at him. "Y-you… y-you m-mean y-you're _not_? Juuji, I thought you _were_ my best friend?"

The dog gaped right back at him for a few moments, and then he dissolved into a fit of barking laughter. "Oh, you're gonna be just fine, crud-stirrer. Let's run before the lame hares on your team get too far ahead."

They did. The exercise felt good, as if Naruto was finally left off the leash after days upon days of boring walking. The good feeling spread through his body, and he didn't feel so much like crying anymore, even though Haku was still at the forefront of his mind. He knew it would take a long, long time before he was able to focus on the good parts without regretting the way it ended – without mourning the could-have-beens.

Haku would have liked Juuji, Naruto was sure.

"Is that…" Sasuke fell silent. He stared at the dog, who walked at Naruto's side and didn't talk at all. Juuji didn't show any explicit signs of being anything more than a well-groomed dog, but then appearing out of nowhere and falling into step with a ninja might have been enough of an indication that there was something unusual about him. "Is that a summon?"

"As if!" Sakura scoffed. "Naruto-baka is not an Inuzuka!"

Sasuke briefly glanced at Sakura with that peculiar expression he made when he mentally compared the girl's intelligence to Naruto's and she came out the loser in the comparison. It didn't happen often, but it was always a treat. "That does not in any way prevent him from summoning a dog, Sakura." He indicated Dog-sensei to illustrate his point.

Apparently, Sakura had somehow missed the fact that Kakashi-sensei summoned ninken, too.

Naruto tilted his way to the side, like he always did when he was making effort to look stupider than everybody already thought he was. "Yeah, I butt-summoned him. Startled, fell on my arse on top of the contract and farted out a load of chakra!"

"You're disgusting!" Sakura cried, sensibilities offended by the mention of bodily functions as though she had never passed wind herself.

"Che. Idiot," Sasuke grumbled, like he often did in response to things going on that didn't result in him being admired. "And they accepted you? They've got no standards. Is a juicy bone to chew all it takes?"

"Oh, right," Juuji said.

"What do you mean, 'oh, right'?!" Sasuke demanded.

Sakura stopped in her tracks. Everyone ignored her high-pitched: " _It talks_!"

"Nothin', man," Juuji replied to Sasuke easily, shrugging his shoulders. "I just finally got why Naruto keeps calling you the Lamppost."

"The _what_?!"

"Naruto! You idiot!"

"Maa, Naruto-kun…" Kakashi-sensei mused placidly, trying to hide a grin under his mask, "a bit unkind."

"…tell me!" Sasuke demanded.

Juuji looked around him, and Naruto could tell the exact moment when the dog decided that, sure, no skin off his nose. "Because, yeah, _piss on you_."

Juuji and Naruto both had a well-honed sense of self-preservation, so they were already running when the entire forest echoed with an enraged bellow of: " _Naruto_!"

x

"Oh dear," said a voice only faintly audible from the bathroom. "Not sure this will come out in the wash. What were you even…?"

The question remained unfinished, because all ninja knew better than to actually ask about details of missions classified higher than C, and even C's were iffy sometimes. A C-rank turned A-rank was definitely a topic to emphatically _not_ be broached, no matter how pissed off anyone was about it.

Kakashi was pretty sure that the Hokage would suffer from tinnitus at least until tomorrow, what with the ringing lecture he had been subjected to.

The fact that no heads rolled in response to the chewing out just illustrated that Kakashi had been right all those years ago, and the Hokage _was_ playing favourites.

"Just throw it out," Kakashi called back. "I got paid for an A-rank today, I can afford a new set of clothes."

He stopped in front of the bookshelf. He pulled out the fifth through ninth _Icha Icha_ (long since moved over from his old apartment, and a long-standing topic of harmless mock-arguments whenever the relationship seemed to stall a little a needed a bit of spicing up). There, in the back of the shelf, was the original of the contract.

"It seems so wasteful…" filtered in across the apartment.

Kakashi pulled out the parchment and unrolled it.

There was a baby-sized smudged handprint under his name.

He sighed.

He slapped his palm over his face.

 _Of course_.

"…but, fine, I officially proclaim this one a lost cause."

x

After a good night's sleep, Naruto was eager to take a ride-along with Ya-san to see the Presentation of triplets that he didn't know, but according to Kana-san were distantly related on her mum's side of the family.

He sat with Kana-san, Ya-san, Juuji, Annai – who was looking a little glum because she wasn't yet deemed ready for her own Presentation – and Chou – who still refused to even acknowledge Naruto.

The ceremony was barely over when some sort of commotion started among the audience.

Naruto didn't find out what it was all about until after the picnic was over and the amphitheatre had mostly emptied out. Shiriyuusu-sama approached them and said, in his rumbling voice: "Kana, your presence is requested by Tsutsuji. And yours, Naruto-kun, if you are not urgently needed in Konoha?"

"Sensei gave us the day off?" Naruto offered.

"Follow me, then."

The trip wasn't long. They went into one of the family dwellings – Naruto hadn't been to one before, so he was curious, only it turned out not to be too different from a human house except the missing kitchen. He guessed that they probably had a different bathroom, too, but there wasn't a chance to ask, as he was led directly to the only occupied room.

"Come in, Naruto-chan," said a voice from inside the door. "Come meet the newest members of our Pack."

There was a tired, heavily breathing dog lying on a heap of pillows and rugs, some of them bloody. Five tiny puppies, pinkish white with light brown spots, still blind, wriggled in a fabric-filled crib. Naruto was afraid he would hurt them if he breathed on them too hard, but then he was nudged from behind and stumbled closer and suddenly Donguri, the new Dad, was putting one of the puppies into Naruto's hands.

Naruto stilled and held his breath, gaping wide-eyed at Donguri's serious face.

"Don't worry so much, Naruto-kun," said Tsutsuji, the Mum, smiling at him from the pile of pillows. "He's a future shinobi; he's tough."

Naruto really wanted to believe that very much, but all he managed was the most tender stroke down the puppy's side with the tips of his fingers. He felt horribly big and strong and clumsy – but at the same time there was a warm feeling of wonder spreading through his insides. "He's so soft…"

"Any suggestions, Naruto?" inquired Kana-san after the med-ninken finished consulting with her and returned to the bed to tend to the new Mum.

Naruto blinked at her. "Huh? For what?"

"A name."

A name for a puppy? From him? But that didn't make sense. "From _me_?"

"Sure," confirmed Donguri. "Why not? Those four will be named after the grandparents, but we didn't quite count on another one. Three or four is more usual."

"It's like you're lending a little bit of your luck to the one you name," explained Kana-san.

"Haku," blurted Naruto's mouth without asking permission from his brain. Shocked at hearing himself say it, he allowed the med-ninken to take the puppy from his hands and swaddle it in a soft blue towel.

"Huh," said Donguri, looking at his mate. "Haku. I like it."

Tsutsuji whuffed, too tired to show any enthusiasm, but obviously not opposed to the suggestion.

"Haku, then," agreed the med-ninken, and deposited the blue towel with the puppy back into Naruto's arms. "Don't get too attached," the old dog said quietly, just to Naruto. "He's too small. Likely as not won't make it through the night."

Naruto's eyes widened. He opened his mouth to protest, to demand that the med-ninken heal the puppy – but just at that moment Tsutsuji finally nodded off, with Kana-san stretched by her side, and Donguri leaned over his newborns, sniffing and occasionally giving one or another a careful lick.

Naruto sank to the floor with his back to a wall. He looked down at the – though they were too polite to say it, he knew what they meant – _runt_ of the litter. So that was why they let him name the puppy. Because they thought the little one wouldn't survive anyway, they gave the family names to the other ones, and fed a fool's hope by having Naruto lend a bit of his luck to the one expected to die. He knew it was _pragmatic_ , but it was also so terribly, terribly unfair.

He stared at the glued-shut eyes and the pink splotch where a proper black nose should grow, and felt tears trickle down his cheeks. "You gotta live, Haku-chan," he whispered. "You _gotta_."

No one kicked him out, and he didn't notice when he fell asleep.

x

"His face looks like the ass end of a rabbit," said Guruko, glaring over Shiba's side at their summoner.

"Doehn't it alwayh'?" inquired Uuhei, mouth full of half-chewed meat strips.

"It is worse than usual," Pakkun admitted, although he wasn't nearly as worried by Kakashi's herbivorous expression as he was by the fact that Kakashi had _eaten apart_ from the rest of the hunt.

And now he was _sitting apart_ from the rest of the hunt, when on another day he would be content to let the ninken climb all over him as long as everyone pretended they didn't know he was doing it for his skin contact fix.

The hunt was used to it. Aside from the actual _mating_ , Kakashi's mate wasn't very cuddly. In fact, the word 'prickly' could be used. Like a hedgehog.

Pakkun did, on the whole, understand Kakashi's choice. Hedgehogs were cute. They smelled good. And if you fed them fruits and veggies and got them to trust you enough they showed you their belly – which was incredibly soft and one of the nicest things in the world to touch.

Still, in between a hedgehog-like person and a dog-like person it was the canine personality that required more tactile grounding, and Kakashi usually got his fill with his hunt.

Today he was sitting alone, hiding behind one of his interchangeable books and deep in thought.

"Wasabi eating contest," Pakkun suggested, dropping onto his butt next to his summoner.

Kakashi considered the idea. "It's skewed in Gai's favour. All the – green."

"The greater the challenge," Pakkun pointed out.

Kakashi nodded.

They sat in silence for a while.

At one point Pakkun decided that if they continued being reticent and evasive at one another they would get nowhere and solve nothing, so he grabbed the proverbial Tora by the tail.

"You only brood when someone dies or when you think you messed up."

No one died recently, aside from those nukenin in Wave, and even though their situation was tragic and fairly traumatising for the kids, Kakashi wouldn't have let it affect him.

Pakkun found himself pinned by one dark eye.

"Saa…" Kakashi said, eye curving up in one of those mocking facial expressions that only superficially resembled a smile.

Yes, yes. Reticence and evasiveness. How very _shinobi_ of the boy.

Pakkun rolled his eyes. "If you really were pissed off at us, you wouldn't have bought us the barbecue."

Kakashi continued mock-smiling. "Ah, I couldn't neglect my faithful hunt, could I?"

And there it was.

Pakkun scowled. "You think we broke faith?"

Kakashi's corkscrew way of thinking was usually an advantage, but once in a while he followed a thought backwards and got tangled in his own reasoning. The ninken hadn't done anything wrong, but maybe they should still be glad the barbecue wasn't laced with something harmless yet very uncomfortable.

Kakashi dismissively waved his hand, which didn't quite have the desired effect, because he was waving around a book of erotica. "No. Letter of _contract_ , and all that."

Pakkun rolled his eyes again. "So, you're brooding because you didn't know that Naruto signed the contract, too." At this point, he could translate from _Kakashi_ to Japanese almost fluently. "And you think that somehow it was my obligation to inform you."

" _Letter_ of contract," Kakashi re-stated.

Not contractual obligation, then, but moral obligation or something equally as nebulous. Humans were complicated, and humans who didn't know how to be properly human were a damn pain in the neck.

"You were invited to his Presentation, Kakashi," Pakkun reminded him. Kakashi hadn't attended any Presentations since Bisuke's. Usually he had the valid excuse of being on a mission, but that didn't change the fact that he was keeping himself out of Pack-life on purpose, and had no leg to stand on in this argument. "And may I remind you that you did not even mention your gennin to us until you needed our help on a mission?"

Kakashi blinked.

Pakkun left him there to chew on that juicy bone and went to join the rest of his hunt to lie in patch of sun and enjoy this rare moment of (nigh on) carefree downtime.

x

When Naruto woke up, his arms were empty.

Haku-chan was sleeping peacefully in between his siblings.


	5. Dog Eat Dog

A/N: Not really a very funny chapter this time, but hopefully enlightening. Enjoy.

Brynn

x

Chapter Five: Dog Eat Dog

x

"Saa," Kakashi said from the roof where he was sitting, reading his book (at this point it was kind of pathetic how hard he tried to appear socially unacceptable, and how little effect it actually had) and not contributing to the completion of the mission at all.

Sasuke ignored him. If the jounin had anything constructive to day, he could surely manage to get it out without prompting. If he simply felt neglected, he could do something shocking and actually get off of his overrated behind to help.

"D'you think this one's a weed?" asked the village idiot, lifting up an herb that would have been useful if he hadn't completely destroyed it with his ham hands.

Sasuke ignored him too. So did Sakura. Maybe one of these days the dead last would catch a clue and stop trying. He should just stick with the dogs. Fitting company for him.

"Saa," Kakashi repeated. His tone was slightly different; just enough to catch Sasuke's attention.

Sasuke continued pulling the weeds from around the rosebushes, but he did watch his designated teacher out of the corner of his eye.

"What is it, sensei?" asked Sakura, seizing the excuse to take a break.

Apparently, D-ranks were _exhausting_ for the Kunoichi of the Year. Go figure. _This village_ , Sasuke thought, looking from the girl whose ability to write tests was prized so highly to the moron who graduated on the pity of the soft-hearted Umino-sensei, to the legendary jounin that turned out to be a lazy anarchist whose sole ambition was to shirk as much responsibility as humanly possible. Granted, he did have _that_ down to an art.

And this, Sasuke reminded himself, pulling on the damn plants much harder than necessary, _this_ was the team the Hokage assigned him to. Could there have been a clearer way of expressing that he wanted the last Uchiha hamstrung and begging for scraps?

Sasuke scoffed. The longer he was around this human offal, the more convinced he became that _that man_ had actually been onto something. The people surrounding him _were_ dragging him down. All of Umino's lip-flapping about loyalty and pride and Will of kami-damned Fire came down to this: tree-hugging and jerking it to philosophical discussions about the meaning of life. Next step – vegetarianism.

Sasuke might have been fond of tomatoes, but there were limits.

"Your teamwork sucks," Kakashi finally managed to string a sentence together.

Sasuke felt a twitch in his right eyelid. Honestly? Wow, what an observation skill. No wonder they touted the man as a genius.

"Whaaat?" yelled the dead last, jumping to his feet like a demented rabbit and waving his arms around. "We totally have teamwork! Come on, Kakashi-sensei-"

"No, you don't," Kakashi said, looking somewhere over the rooftops, as if he was consulting his discovery with the clouds like Shikamaru.

Shikamaru at least usually had actual discoveries worth consulting. He could have been a teammate worth keeping around, so of course the administration dragged him down with a fat slowpoke and another useless fangirl. Sasuke was sensing a theme.

Not to mention that Konoha called this practice a 'tradition' and was actually _proud of it_.

There were days, few and far between (more frequent lately) when Sasuke felt (hatefully) like maybe _that man_ was absolutely right in burning his bridges and leaving this outhouse pit of a village behind. Sasuke still wanted to kill him, of course, but the general idea of getting the hell out of here had merit. It had lots of merit.

"I thought the mission to Wave would teach you to value your teammates," Kakashi said in a mournful tone, "but it did not do enough."

"I could improve faster," Sasuke pointed out. He _used to_ improve faster when he went to the Academy, killed the entire morning and part of the afternoon sitting at a damn desk, and only had a chance to train on his own afterwards. Nowadays he still trained, but by the time he got home he was usually so tired and demoralised that he had to force himself into it. He felt barely any joy from exercise anymore, and once in a while injured himself through lack of focus.

He was _devolving_.

There could be no clearer proof that this so-called team was holding him back. So, in a way, he had been taught to value his teammates – in the negatives, where they belonged.

Sakura took a step toward him (unaware that Sasuke used the cover of the rosebushes to start the hand signs for the _Goukakyuu no jutsu_ ). Her eyes were huge and watery. "But, Sasuke-kun, we could help you-"

"How?" Sasuke snapped, too close to the edge already to go back to his usual mask of tacit long-sufferance. "Tell me, Sakura- _chan_ , how do you think _you_ could help me?"

That seemed to finally hit the mark. Haruno went white as chalk and her twig-like arms trembled. There was an expression of horrified realization on her face (and maybe it shocked Sasuke a little how much he liked it). "I- I'll train," she stammered. "I'll become stronger."

"Hn." Sasuke doubted it. Just look at how _very soon_ in her _training_ she came to realise that she needed to _train_ , that she was just a seldom useful hanger-on who tried to coast on Sasuke's name and skills and Naruto's unnatural luck.

"I will!" she maintained with clenched fists and tearing eyes. "I promise. I will help you realise your dream!"

Sasuke had a momentary vision of Sakura going into a fight against _that man_ and getting sliced up into tiny strips of meat within a fraction of a second. It was a nice thought. Certainly it helped him calm down a little.

"And you, Naruto?" Kakashi asked, as if the Sakura problem was solved with this impassioned proclamation about a self-betterment to come at some unspecified point in the future.

No, Sasuke told himself, think instead about what _that man_ would do to her. There was a little joy even in this bleak existence!

"I'm good at teamwork," argued the idiot. "Kana-san told me so."

Over the course of his studies at the Academy, Naruto had talked too much for ten people, but mentioned by name three individuals only – Hokage-sama himself and the two proprietors of a ramen stand. As inconsequential as Sasuke had found his inept classmate at the time, it was hard to miss that Naruto had no parents, no family, no friends to speak of and no one to rely on.

Sasuke had just had too many of his own problems to care.

'Kana-san' then, by process of elimination, had to be one of the dog summons – and that made Sasuke scowl at the unfairness of it all. No one signed a summoning contract without first deserving it, and what could Naruto have done at the time to deserve any such thing? Nothing. It was charity from the dogs. It was _pity_.

Sasuke would have unashamedly resented the whole set of circumstances, if not for the fact that it might have been the only reason why his teammate was even half-way civilised. What with having been left to grow up on his own. Sort of like Sasuke himself was, but from an even earlier age.

 _This village_.

Kakashi vaguely waved his head. "Teamwork in a hunt is a little different than gennin team-"

"How?" the dead last cut in. "'cause so far the biggest difference is that your hunt likes you, and isn't a mean, name-calling bastard to you, and doesn't give you a headache with their screeching."

Sasuke hadn't expected this to happen, but for once he agreed with Naruto. Solely on the last point, but still.

Kakashi's only visible eye narrowed in suspicion. He stared down from the roof at the dead last for a prolonged while, and then inquired: "You have augmented hearing?"

"Aug-men-ted?" repeated the idiot, head tilted to the side as he tried to figure out the meaning of the word.

"Improved," Kakashi helped him.

"Much improved," Naruto agreed cheerfully, "since the last time Sakura screeched and I went mostly deaf for a while except for the ringing."

Sasuke rolled his eyes and turned back to the weeding. What a moron.

"Fine." Kakashi clapped his hands with that faux happiness that always set Sasuke's teeth on edge. "Homework. Sasuke, find uses for your teammates in a plan to achieve your dream. Naruto, next time you have a problem, ask your teammates before you summon a ninken. Sakura…" There was a pause while Kakashi looked up at the sky and followed the path of one of the blackbirds. "…learn to not screech."

" _Wha-at_?" Sakura screeched.

x

Sasuke-kun was wearing that expression that he always used to have on his face during taijutsu classes at the Academy.

Cool, yes, but also exasperated. He knew he was wasting his time. His taijutsu was far too advanced for the Academy – even the teachers had said so. Sometimes, if there was time, Mizuki-sensei would take Sasuke aside for a little one-on-one practice.

Sakura remembered those times fondly. The girls all loved to watch.

"Hn," Sasuke-kun said, and turned his face away from Kakashi-sensei.

Kakashi-sensei clapped his hands, and with that smile of his that – Sakura was beginning to realise – was actually a warning sign of some kind of pedagogical cruelty coming their way, he announced: "Only a true team of ninja can succeed in the Chuunin Exams. If you are serious about entering, I want to see some teamwork."

"I don't mind pounding the Lamppost into dirt-" offered stupid Naruto, and just barely dodged a shuriken from Sasuke-kun by replacing himself with a clone. The clone disappeared in a puff of chakra.

 _Idiot_ , inner Sakura agreed with her public self.

"I can't spar with him," Sasuke-kun protested in a low voice. "If he lifts his leg in my direction, I'll… punch him in the crotch."

 _So savage_ , inner Sakura commented gleefully. _Yeah, let's see more of that. Sasuke-kun is so dominant – a true alpha male!_

"No need to be nervous," Kakashi-sensei assured him, with just a hint of mockery in his voice. "We can all agree that you're both a tad too young for water sports."

Sasuke-kun blinked. His brow furrowed.

Naruto, somewhere off to the side where Sakura could almost safely ignore him – never completely though, always on the lookout just in case she'd be assaulted with another uncouth extolling of his dubious skills as a shinobi – coughed himself onto the ground.

 _Idiot_ , inner Sakura repeated.

Public Sakura, however, was too puzzled to pay her any attention. She thought of the past summer, much of which was spent by the lake with her friends and classmates. " _Ano_ , sensei, what makes you say-"

"A-anyway," Kakashi-sensei spoke over her as if he hadn't noticed her at all – provoking a response from inner Sakura that consisted almost entirely of beeps and punctuation, "sparring is a part of team training. Do you train as a team?"

I'd rather get beaten up by Ino-pig, Sakura thought.

 _Yeah_ , inner Sakura added, _and Ino-pig pulls hair. The bitch._

"I get more workout from the post in my garden," announced Sasuke-kun.

The disdain in his voice made him look so hot that Sakura fanned herself. That face. That body. That _attitude_.

"Eh," sensei mused, "could be right. You're too far ahead to be able to teach your teammates anything constructive. Let's try it with the two who actually need to catch up in taijutsu."

Stupid Naruto stood up, rubbed the back of his head – his hair was full of dirt, _ew_ – and looked up at their sensei doubtfully. "Spar with Sakura? Like, hit her?"

"You think, dead last?" scoffed Sasuke-kun.

Sakura giggled. Sasuke-kun was _funny_.

"Naruto…" Kakashi-sensei muttered long-sufferingly. "Sakura in not a civilian."

 _Damn right, Shannaro!_

"Oh…" stupid Naruto said stupidly. And then, even more stupidly, with dawning realisation: "Ooohhh." He turned to face Sakura. He grinned.

"What are you staring at, stupid?" Sakura demanded. She assumed the basic stance and raised her hands, ready to defend or attack.

"Taijutsu only?" Naruto asked, as if sensei had not already specified that so clearly. "Okay. I'll hit, like, with quarter of my power?"

"What?!" Sakura demanded. "I can take whatever you dish out! I'll punch you in the head, idiot!" She usually did, when he was acting especially moronic, or especially annoying. He dodged a lot of the hits, but not all, and seeing him hit the floor was always so satisfying.

"Maa…"

"Naruto…" Sakura growled.

"I thought killing teammates was against the rules," Naruto pointed out.

"As if you could-"

"Hn."

"Children," Kakashi-sensei cut in, "let's channel all that energy into the spar. Naruto, up to half power. Sakura, take this seriously. Begin!"

Before Naruto could even shift into a fighting stance, Sakura surged forward. He did manage to mostly dodge the power-hit she aimed at his head-

A moment later there was pain. Sakura doubled around a rabbit-punch to her stomach. Her ribs flared up in sudden fire and she barely noticed the blue-and-orange elbow coming at her face-

Everything went black.

x

"Uhh… is she gonna be alright?" inquired stupid Naruto's stupid voice.

"If you broke her, maybe we could get someone that's not so annoying," said another voice with cool dark humour, and Sakura's lips twitched – before she recognised the voice as Sasuke-kun's and opened her eyes and found the rest of her team staring at her.

Surely Sasuke-kun hadn't been talking about her… right?

"I'm sorry, Kakashi-sensei," Naruto whined. "I didn't know her ribs would break like that. Annai-chan can take a punch and keep going, and she's not even a proper ninken yet."

Did he just compare me to a dog? Sakura wondered.

 _Negatively_?!

"Naruto… I'll kill you," she hissed between her teeth. Her stomach and chest ached like the devil. Naruto was the _worst_.

"Right," said Sasuke-kun.

Sakura almost levitated off of the mattress, buoyed by Sasuke-kun's confidence in her.

 _Sarcasm_ , inner Sakura pointed out. _It's a thing_.

Sakura crashed back into reality.

It hurt.

Her eyes watered.

"You'll be in pain for a while, Haruno-kun," said the attending medic nin, shooing the rest of Team Seven out of the hospital room. "I've mended the breaks, but it's better for the bruise to heal naturally. Keep it to a light workout for the next three days."

"So I can go home?" Sakura inquired. She felt like perhaps she might need to be carried.

Stupid Naruto could have left a couple of clones behind. At least they were good for something.

The iryounin frowned and adjusted her glasses. "I'd rather keep you in for observation for at least two more hours. Just in case we missed something – concussion sometimes takes a while to be detectable. You certainly have an admirable shiner."

Sakura was honestly, cross her heart and hope to die, going to hurt Naruto so very, very badly for this. Even if she had to train like mad – it would all be worth it when she punched his irritating face in.

x

"Ne… Ya-san?" Naruto asked as they lay in the sunlit spot after they finished training for the day. His eyes tracked the zig-zag path of a pale violet butterfly.

"Hm?" The shaggy dog looked up from the book he had been reading.

"I was curious."

Ya-san grinned, baring pointy, gleaming teeth – though not nearly as menacing as Rikku could be if he tried. "When are you not, Naruto-kun?"

"Uhh…" Naruto scratched the back of his head. "'s that a bad thing?"

"No, not at all. Just make sure you don't offend people when you don't mean to. You wouldn't like having your privacy invaded, would you?"

"What privacy?"

Naruto had been followed everywhere by ANBU since he could remember. They stopped being so obvious about it after he started at the Academy, and these days Naruto rarely even noticed anyone watching him, but he didn't doubt that they always knew where he was.

At least now he knew why they did it. If something happened to him, the Kyuubi might have gotten out. Nobody wanted that.

"Good point," Ya-san agreed. "What did you want to ask?"

"Err…" Naruto backtracked from thoughts about his secret assassin bodyguards to privacy to asking questions. What had he wanted to ask…? Oh, _butterflies_. Of course. "It's about Chou-chan. I didn't know about her. You never talk about her. Is that 'cause she's not a ninja? Are you disappointed? Is that why you don't-"

"Yes and no," Ya-san replied, stopping Naruto before he could really start rambling.

"Huh?"

"Chou chose to be a civilian," explained the ninken. "I am not disappointed, but it is the duty of ninja to protect the civilians. Especially when they are our family. Civilians cannot defend themselves, Naruto-kun, so we must protect them."

"And the best way you can protect them is that you don't expose them to danger," Naruto filled in, paraphrasing Iruka-sensei. That made sense. "Doesn't it make you sad?"

"Sometimes." Ya-san nodded solemnly, and hit the grass with his tail. "But Chou is happy in civilian life, and seeing her happy makes me happy."

Naruto lay back down with his arms under his head. He closed his eyes against the still-bright sunlight. "That's really nice. That – seeing someone happy makes you happy." He remembered the way Kana-san and Ya-san looked at one another, Juuji and Annai's excited barking, Rikku's narrow-eyed amusement, Iruka-sensei's bright grins, the ripple of Dog-san's mask. He smiled. "I think I know what you mean."


	6. The Whisper Campaign

A/N: Megachapter, because I suddenly discovered I didn't have enough Iruka in this story. And then he sort of took over and refused to let go.

I fudged the relationships between the characters here. A little. In TYN Anko and Kakashi were established as sort of belligerently friendly colleagues in ANBU, but Iruka and Anko had not so much as met. Still, I like the idea of friendship between the two of them, even if they wouldn't have a reason to meet outside of Missions Desk… eh, maybe I'll figure out a backstory for that, too. It will probably (almost certainly) feature Naruto's shenanigans.

Also, I've got a half-written prequel centering on Iruka from the time of the Kyuubi attack until he starts teaching at the Academy. If I ever finish that, some of the allusions in this chapter will make more sense. Notably, _chibi-sensei_ used to be a thing with younger Iruka.

x

Chapter Six: The Whisper Campaign

x

A free afternoon was a rarity for Iruka. Those few days he had off of work were spent catching up on housework or correcting homework, so basically still all work.

Not that he particularly minded – he wasn't sure what he would be doing if he didn't have a tight schedule, and he had a suspicion that it might have led to him doing what most ninja did: developing some kind of nasty habit.

It was better to keep himself busy. Less time wasted on regret and contemplation of would-have-beens.

Once in a while, however, he forced himself to stop and take a true day off, off of everything. It reset his head enough for him not to get too tangled in his life or trip himself up with routine and far too many preconceived notions. It was a rule he was going to instate and enforce once he was promoted high enough at the Academy, and he was determined to set a good example.

This Saturday afternoon Iruka had fled to one of the empty training grounds, took perch on a wide, relatively comfortable branch, and immersed himself in reading-

"That's not _your_ book," said Naruto's voice.

Naruto himself was standing under Iruka, craning his head, eyes narrowed.

Iruka suppressed a sigh.

"What makes you say that?" he inquired, looking down at his leisure reading. He had – prudently – made a cover for it out of old newspaper. Foresight was imperative in the life of a shinobi; for Shinobi Academy instructors that went twice.

Naruto tapped the side of his nose.

Iruka would have been exasperated, except he actually had borrowed the book, and Naruto figuring it out _without Iruka having any idea how_ made him understandably nervous. He was well aware that Naruto had graduated last in his class because of bias and a dedicated sabotaging campaign; otherwise he would have had a better overall score than Shikamaru or Kiba. The final results had made Naruto's current teacher ecstatic for getting on his team both the last Sharingan user and the boy he had protected throughout his infancy.

What the results hadn't accomplished was warn anyone that might come into contact with Naruto of the fact that he had skills. He had unknown and often unpredictable skills. He had mysterious knowledge and friends in odd places where no friends could be rationally expected.

Naruto in a plotting mode made Iruka nervous.

Right now Naruto was pouting, and that wasn't always the better option – one never knew which way the boy's mood would shift in the next instance.

"Shouda known, 'ttebayo," he grumbled, glaring at the book that was absolutely covered up and, in the hands of a conservative Academy teacher, definitely could not even be suspected of containing anything but the highest form of literature. Naruto scoffed. "You're the type to hate orange."

"Eh?" Iruka pretended to be stumped. It was easy, because he was stumped – just not by the question itself. How the heck did Naruto know?

" _Che_ ," huffed the little menace. "At least Kakashi-sensei doesn't hide _the orange_."

No, he didn't, Iruka admitted. His jitters were beginning to transform into actual worry. It occurred to him that he wasn't ready for Naruto to become a full-fledged shinobi, much less one that had been taught mind-games by Hatake Kakashi.

Then Naruto grinned. "You should buy me some ramen again one of these days, Iruka-sensei. I could get you all sorts of paydirt on Kakashi-sensei." He winked and walked away.

Iruka went back to his book. He decided to compartmentalise the conversation away and let it worry him tomorrow. Maybe, he mused, Naruto's offer had merit. There had to be some way of getting neater mission reports out of some of the more notorious jounin… right?

x

Iruka hunted down his favourite former student three days later. He expected that an offer of free ramen would, as always, be accepted with enthusiasm.

However, he hadn't expected to find Naruto with company.

"I didn't know you knew Konohamaru-kun, Naruto," Iruka remarked, annoyed with himself. This was the kind of thing he should have known. Naruto wasn't exactly… well… Iruka didn't mean to hurt anyone, but Naruto really wasn't a good example for someone like the heir of the Sarutobi Clan.

"Met a while ago," Naruto replied, grinning.

Which could have meant anything, Iruka realised. It could have been five minutes or five years, and he really, honestly, couldn't even guess.

"Konohamaru-kun," he said instead, giving his attention to the younger child who, hopefully, wasn't nearly as good at dissembling. "Shouldn't you be with Ebisu-san?"

The boy gave Iruka a mulish expression that matched Naruto's most recalcitrant moments, turned his face away, and refused to budge an inch.

"Iruka-sensei, sometimes teachers suck," Naruto announced. Before Iruka could chide him for his language, he continued: "And sometimes they're _burning sacks of cat shit_ – not my words, but I think Ya-san nailed it." Then he turned to the smaller boy. "Kono-kun, this is Iruka-sensei, from the Shinobi Academy. He's the third kind of teacher."

Iruka made a mental note to find out who was 'Ya-san' and make sure that they weren't a bad influence on Naruto. He had a valid suspicion they were.

"Do you wanna know who Iruka-sensei really is?" Naruto asked, tone shifting from conversational to baiting.

"So, he's not just a teacher?" Konohamaru-kun replied, dubiously squinting up.

Iruka didn't like where this was going.

"He's the best Academy teacher there is!" Naruto yelled.

Iruka chuckled to himself. He didn't think that was exactly objective, because this boy had been a special case, and not in a positive meaning of the words. Still, Iruka took the compliment as it was meant and cherished it.

"And what?" spat Konohamaru-kun. "He's just like Sunglasses. They're all the same."

"He's different," Naruto insisted. "Iruka-sensei is a _Contender_!"

"A what?"

"Yes, Naruto," Iruka cut into the comedic exchange, sensing the approaching danger. " _What_ am I?"

"A Contender," the little terror replied confidently, as if he wasn't pulling this all out of his butt. "I know I'm not supposed to know, but come on, Iruka-sensei!" He waved his hands. "You can't expect me to miss this! See, brat, Iruka-sensei is _hardcore_. I've seen him take a fuuma shuriken to the back and not even pause in running his mission-"

That wasn't entirely the truth either, Iruka mused, frowning. In fact, it was pretty far from the truth. Close to the other end of the spectrum of veracity, in fact. He had _dodged_ that fuuma shuriken.

"-and have you seen one of those things? Spread your arms? Yeah, about that big in diameter."

Konohamaru, shocked by Naruto's exuberance, had actually unthinkingly obeyed the order. Now he was standing with his arms spread wide, head swiveling from one hand to the other, gauging how big that fuuma shuriken had been.

Iruka decided it was about the highest time to interfere-

"So, the thing is, Kono-kun, I'm gonna be Hokage. But if the Old Man kicks it while I'm still too young to take over, I definitely won't mind if Iruka-sensei takes the Hat in the meantime."

What? Iruka blinked, and then palmed his face. Kami, Naruto did not just imply what Iruka feared Naruto implied, right?

"So he's a…" Konohamaru finally let his arms down and turned to gape at Iruka, open-mouthed. "He's a _Hokage candidate_?!"

The last words were exclaimed at such a high volume and pitch, that the little group immediately became the centre of attention of all ninja in the training grounds nearby.

Naruto solemnly nodded.

Iruka smacked him in the back of the head with his book. The clone dispersed, and another Naruto popped out from behind a tree trunk, giving Iruka an injured pout.

"Stop lying to your _kouhai_ , Naruto!" Iruka ordered.

The boy gave him a worryingly convincing innocent look. "B-but… I'm not lying, Iruka-sensei! I've seen you take on a guy with a fuuma shuriken!" He leaned down to Konohamaru and faux confidentially added: "He totally saved my life that day!"

Konohamaru's bemusement gradually turned into unadulterated awe.

When, oh when did Naruto learn to lie like this? Iruka bemoaned inside his head, while he scrambled for some inspired idea that might mitigate this situation.

"Ramen?" he suggested reflexively.

Naruto's face lit up. " _Yatta_! Yes, yes, yes!" His hands were suddenly around Iruka's arm and pulling. "C'mon, Iruka-sensei, let's go. Kono-kun, I'll see you 'round!"

x

"Naruto, you really shouldn't have said that to Konohamaru-kun," Iruka admonished over his second and Naruto's fifth bowl of ramen.

Naruto grinned at sideways and without chewing gulped down all the noodles in his mouth. "Did you see his face?!"

Iruka chuckled under his breath. It was hard to be strict when he, too, saw the amusement value. Still, he was a teacher, and needs must. "The Hokage – Naruto, that's a position one earns for unparalleled skill and bravery. It's a great honour, but a greater responsibility."

"I _know_ ," Naruto drawled.

Iruka rolled his eyes. "Just, it's a serious thing, okay?"

Naruto nodded, but he didn't exactly bother with trying to make Iruka believe him. Iruka had let the boy grow closer over the past few years, and maybe that was why Naruto never really believed that public persona, anymore. He knew the _real_ Iruka underneath.

Umino Iruka was well-known as a stickler for rules. People made fun of him for it. They even pointed out how as a child Iruka had been well-known for the very opposite… not entirely unlike Naruto.

He found it amusing to be such a perfect counterpoint to his significant other in this – a misspent youth, a one-eighty at some time during puberty, public perception that didn't much reflect the truth of his personality…

He chuckled.

Iruka wasn't a stickler for rules. He was, however, the type of person who wanted to know how things worked and why. He always went to the root of things. So, when it came to rules, Iruka usually knew when they were instated, why, and whether bypassing them was safe or whether it would result in real trouble.

"The position of the Hokage isn't something that can be given to anyone like a trading card, Naruto," he said seriously. "The Hokage has to be someone admirable."

Naruto nodded again. However, instead of claiming that one day it would be him, he said: "I totally agree with that, sensei."

x

"Where did you say we should meet Moegi-chan?" asked the older boy, looking down at what was obviously his younger brother or cousin, sitting in the place next to him at the counter.

" _The market_ , nii-chan," the smaller boy whined in the tone of someone who had already answered the same question at least five times.

Ayame giggled and gave the vat of noodles another stir.

"Yeah, yeah." The older boy rolled his eyes. "But 'the market' is kinda big, if you didn't notice. And there's _millions_ of people everywhere! And Moegi-chan's _tiny_ , so-"

"We usually meet by the water fountain."

"Ah," the older boy sighed blissfully, and put his chopsticks down across the bowl he had just emptied. "That hit the spot."

"Can we go now?!" whined the younger boy.

"So eager to share the news, huh?" the older boy teased.

The younger one hopped off the stool to the ground, nearly stumbled over his long scarf and waved his hands around. "It's _huge_ , nii-chan! I never thought Iruka-sensei was that strong! I need to be the first one to tell Moegi he's gonna be the Hokage!"

The older boy gave Ayame a polite head-tilt while he paid for their meals. Then he put on a strict expression as he turned to his excited sibling. "And you're absolutely sure this isn't just a made-up rumour?"

The little boy jumped up and down. "Jiji told me! And Jiji's the Hokage now, so he would know best!"

Ayame, far too late, figured out that the little boy was actually Konohamaru-chan. She didn't know the Sandaime's grandson personally, but she had heard a couple of stories from Naruto-kun, and… and…. What had they just said about Iruka-san?!

Ayame blinked. The boys were already walking down the street.

Iruka-san was going to be the Hokage? Oh, she needed to tell Dad right away! And Michi-san from the apartment down the hall! And the girls from the ikebana club! And her friend Yuta-

"Oi!" barked a scowling construction worker sitting at the counter. "What's a guy gotta do to get some service here?!"

"Right away, customer-san," Ayame replied, pasting a smile over the scowl she felt coming on. "Have you heard the latest news…?"

x

"I wanna try it too, nii-chan!" Moegi wheedled as soon as Konohamaru finished extolling how they had disseminated the information about Iruka-sensei.

Naruto had to admit that using Konohamaru's connection to the Old Man was kind of cheating, in that it made the rumour instantly far more believable than it should have been, but… they were ninja. And ninja should know how to use their advantages in any situation.

He beamed down at the kids. "Sure. Why not?"

Konohamaru pouted. "This is _our_ operation, nii-chan!"

Naruto, still under an Oiroke transformation that made him look like another member of the Sarutobi family, put his hand on his hip and emulated Old Hag Suzuran's teachery look. "Is or is not Moegi-chan a member of your team, Kono-kun?"

Konohamaru pouted. When the girl poked him in the ribs hard enough to rock him on his heels, he muttered to the ground: "Is."

Naruto nodded decisively. "Then show me how good your teamwork is. I'll stay here-" He pointed at a stand with some hand-dyed clothing (civilian, of course) and took a quick glance around. "-and watch how you do. Stay within sight. Now, go!"

He watched them move on, quietly conferring as they meandered around adult customers and – at one point – ducked under a counter of a beekeeper's stand, but most of his attention was occupied by the wares in front of him.

Civilian clothing didn't last very long, so the only articles Naruto ever bought were t-shirts. They were cheap enough, and it was kind of difficult to find any ninja clothes in orange. He'd have to have them commissioned, and that was more expensive than he could afford.

Wearing plain black or dark blue ninja pants and mesh with an orange t-shirt turned out to be a compromise that he had managed (with Ya-san's help) to sell Kana-san on.

"How much for these two?" he asked of the vendor, who was occupying herself with embroidering a blouse. He held up the t-shirts in question: one a lighter orange with an ornamental rendition of the Sun in the front, the other tie-died white-orange-brown.

"If you take both, I'll give them to you for two hundred," said the woman without much interest.

Naruto happily shelled out the money. If not for his Oiroke, it would have cost him three times as much, or he might have been refused service entirely.

Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed the commotion between the vendors. They were meeting in between stands, speaking, sometimes exclaiming loudly. One stringy guy in particular yelled all over the square: "No sodding way's that true!"

Moments later the two pranksters careened into his legs. Naruto barely managed to pack his purchases.

"Got this for you, nii-chan!" Moegi announced, handing over a hair-tie. "Your hair's long enough like this! Now you can wear a ponytail and look like Iruka-sensei, too!"

Naruto took the present and, with some little difficulties, managed to force his unfamiliar hair back and up. He had no idea if the style even resembled Iruka-sensei, but the way Moegi clapped and Konohamaru gave him a thumb-up suggested it wasn't a total loss.

"Emulating your teacher, huh?" asked a customer from the next stall. A kunoichi, although not one Naruto (or his nose) recognised.

Naruto's eyes narrowed in a smile. "Iruka-sensei is my idol!" he said enthusiastically. "Ever since I heard he was gonna be the new Hokage, I wanted to be just like him!"

x

Kakashi didn't put much stock into 'keeping a finger on the pulse of Konoha', but he made it a point to not ignore his surroundings whenever circumstances placed him into the middle of a group of people.

Usually those people were senior shinobi.

Today, they were the guests and staff of a teahouse.

Now, he didn't spend much time in teahouses, neither the literal ones, nor the ones with the red lanterns in the windows. Whatever people found in either of the kinds, he had at home.

Lucky him.

Still, once in a while the tea at home ran low. While Kakashi was pretty sure that the problem would have solved itself – he wasn't the one responsible for groceries, after several not-entirely-intentional mishaps – but he liked this task. He liked making a thoughtful gesture, giving a gift, and directly benefitting from it.

Besides, Kirimi-san, the proprietor of this teahouse, was an old acquaintance, and she never steered him wrong when it came to leaves.

"You must have heard something!" insisted one of the dolled up civilian housewives sitting around the absolutely cramped table in the back.

"Oh, I don't know what to tell you!" replied another of the human dolls. "Genji-kun is not in his class at the Academy. I only met him the once-"

"What is he like?"

Kakashi reacted to the word 'Academy' by focusing a little more on what up until now was a mindless exchange of mindless gossip. Besides, according to the cashier, it was still a few minutes before Kirimi-san would finish her work in the back and come attend him.

"I don't… I don't remember…" said the beleaguered woman. "Polite?"

"Handsome?" another suggested.

"Strong?"

"Got to be strong, Nai-chan, if he's going to become _Hokage_."

Kakashi blinked. _What_?

" _So_ handsome," asserted one of the women. She had dark-blue hair, the kind that Kakashi had only ever seen on some of the Hyuuga. "I mean, there's the scar, but it just makes him look so much more rugged…"

There were sighs all around the table.

Kakashi put his book down and was half-tempted to push up his hitai-ate, too, just so he could be sure that this wasn't a genjutsu. He wasn't aware of pissing off either Kurenai or Asuma lately, but maybe this was some weird jounin-sensei competition?

Surely they weren't talking about _Iruka_?

"My honourable husband," said the blue-haired one, "heard about it from Nara-sama himself. Only in passing, mind you. I must admit he…" She hid her face in her hands.

Tension rose around the table. A white border collie moved closer to the woman, set its head into her lap and looked up with sympathetic eyes.

Kakashi pushed up the hitai-ate.

Ah.

That explained so much.

"…he was _so_ angry. You know how he feels about Kiri, and the prospect of having a Hokage with a name like that…"

"Poor Naruko-chan," said a blonde, patting the blue-haired one's shoulder. "To have to comfort her husband in such difficult circumstances."

The mood rapidly shifted again. 'Naruko' smirked. "Oh, I did comfort him. I comforted him so well, in fact, that-"

There were giggles and blushes all around the table, and 'Naruko' lowered her voice as she retold an apparently very scandalous story about the intimate details of her and her husband's private life.

The collie huffed and tried to put its paws over its ears.

Kakashi shook his head. Only Naruto… Well, Kakashi definitely wasn't going to ruin anybody's fun.

He pushed the hitai-ate down and turned around to face the counter just as Kirimi-san limped out and bowed to him.

"Excuse the wait, Kakashi-san. Now, what can I get you, and how big does the apology need to be?"

"I don't need to apologise this time, Kirimi- _chan_ ," he replied shamelessly. "Just replenishing the exhausted stores a little. Say, do you know that blue-haired lady over there? I thought she might be a Hyuuga-"

"Careful where your eyes stray, Kakashi-san," admonished the proprietor. "That one's married. And so are you, I should remind you, or as good as. Maybe you should reconsider the apology, ne?"

'Naruko' was a regular at the teashop, then. Interesting. Very interesting. Maybe Kakashi should take a second, closer look at his team.

And maybe he should spend a couple of minutes contemplating his relationship, too. He wasn't sure how much he liked that 'as good as'.

"I'm sure I'll do something worth an apology soon enough," he admitted… and decided to keep his knowledge of Naruto's long-term prank to himself.

x

The first one was Raidou.

He didn't so much ask as step up in front of Iruka (stopping right on the edge of invading his personal bubble) and scrutinise Iruka from the toes peeking out of his sandals to the ragged end of his ponytail. Then he scoffed and walked away without a word.

x

Then there was Yoshino-san. She handed over a mission report and, while Iruka was checking that everything was filled in correctly – he didn't really doubt Yoshino-san on this; she was one of the few you could rely on to turn in impeccable reports – she mentioned: "I heard you were being considered for promotion, Iruka-san."

It took Iruka's elsewhere engaged brain almost half a minute to chew through the remark. Then he glanced up, surprised. "R-really? I didn't hear anything. Is Mitsuhara-sensei retiring?"

Yoshino-san frowned. "Not really the kind of promotion I meant."

Iruka laughed embarrassedly to cover up for the un-abating sting of failure. "Eh, no way. I've tried for jounin once, and it's obvious that I just don't have it in me. And I do like my job at the Academy too much to trade it in for assassinations anyway."

Yoshino-san paused to consider this, and then shrugged. "I figured the rumour was bogus."

Iruka stamped the report and added it to the Outbox. "Thank you for your hard work, Yoshino-san."

"Thank you for yours, Iruka-san. See you later…" She waved.

Iruka faced the next ninja in the queue.

x

It was Anko who finally clued him in.

They were sitting at her favourite dango stand – Iruka trying to correct some tests, Anko doing her best to distract him. Which, in practice, meant that Iruka only remembered the tests when he realised he had dribbled sauce over the top-most one.

"You sure you don't want to pay for my share, too?" The kunoichi leered at him. "I'd take you home-"

Iruka let himself blush. "Not on your life, Anko-san. I am very happy with what I've got."

"So," she stated, raising her eyebrows, "you _do_ have someone."

Iruka wasn't going to try and deny it. On one hand, it wouldn't be fair to Anko to imply that she had a chance with him, in case she actually meant some of her flirting seriously. On the other, he occasionally found it impossible to act like he wasn't in love, and since Anko was quickly becoming one of his closest friends, that kind of deception would have been pointless in the long run.

Nonetheless, he wasn't about to be interrogated. "It's nothing regular-"

" _Irregular_ , then?" She leaned forwards over her empty paper plate.

Iruka pretended that the intimidation tactic didn't work on him. He solemnly nodded. "Absolutely irregular. But also absolutely non-negotiable."

"Huh." Anko moved away from him and leaned against the backers of her chair, pulling one of her heels up onto the seat – a pose for which she definitely wasn't dressed, and which made Iruka appreciate the non-transparency of the table. "That means I should stop telling the girls at ANBU Headquarters all the details of our steamy sexcapades, huh?"

Iruka laughed, loud and unrestrained. For a moment the professional façade of the Academy instructor completely fell apart – but he was quick in quelling his mirth and restoring his composure. He shook his head, still smiling. "No need for such restraint, Anko-san. Some of your stories have found their way back to me and, let's just say, they were _inspiring_."

"Ooh, 'ruka-kun's got hidden depths."

They weren't exactly hidden. It was just that the Academy was a place of some seriousness, and that the parents had to be able to trust Iruka when they were leaving their children in his care. It was a no small responsibility.

He did his best to deserve that trust.

"I assure you," he explained, grinning, "my significant other is aware of your propensity for creative story-telling, and quite secure regarding my affections."

Anko pouted. "You're not going to give me a hint?"

"No." Iruka shook his head, resolute on this point. "This thing – it's private."

Anko responded by stealing the rest of Iruka's dango. He let her. He liked dango, but not nearly as much as she did (quite possibly no one liked it as much as she did).

"Ha!" she exclaimed happily. "How did this significant other react to the news that you're gonna be the Hokage?"

Iruka gaped at her. " _What_ news?"

Anko gaped back, showing off masticated dumplings in her half-open mouth. "You mean… wait, you didn't know?"

"I didn't know _what_?"

"You didn't know you are going to be the Hokage?"

They stared at one another for a few seconds, and then she cackled, spraying bits of dough and spit over the test papers.

Of all the things, Iruka mused, exasperated. Really? _Really?_ At least – judging by Raidou's and Yoshino-san's reactions, most ninja were smart enough not to fall for such a ridiculous rumour.

 _Most_.

"Ah, Iruka-sensei, I heard you were a serious Contender for the position of the Hokage," said Kakashi, turning up out of nowhere at the corner of Iruka's and Anko's table.

Iruka, owing to a lot of practice in similar situations, looked at him almost impassively. "Funny, Kakashi-sensei – I've heard the exact same about you."

"Go away," snapped Anko. "Can't you see we're busy?"

"Maa-"

"You're crashing my date with this cutie, _Mutt_. Go away before I stab you somewhere soft."

Kakashi made a point of checking Iruka out, before shrugging disinterestedly and turning to the kunoichi. "He's cute enough, I suppose. What's he doing with a hag like you, Anko?"

Anko let out a short, perfectly controlled blast of killing intent. "Imma stab you anyway-"

"Maa…" He walked away, head buried in a virulent pink book, of the contents of which no one in sight had any doubts.

"That guy!" Anko grumbled. "One of these days I'll figure out where he lives and creep the shit out of him."

Iruka glanced at the back of the retreating jounin and winced. He really, really hoped that wouldn't be the case.

x

If there had been only one or two of them, Iruka probably would have dragged them to the Hokage's office by their ears. But there were three, and he couldn't quite bring himself to pick and exclude one of them.

He wished he knew how to create a Kage Bunshin, but in lieu of a third hand, he solved his problem by tying them all up and together, and carrying them over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes.

His expression must have been fearsome, because the hallways of the Hokage tower mysteriously cleared for him, and he was allowed to pass straight into Hokage-sama's office without having to wait at all.

"Iruka-kun," Hokage-sama said affably. "I see your hunt was successful."

The Hokage's secretary glared for a moment, before resuming her professional poise and gathering the tray with the empty teapot and cups from the desk. She carried it out of the room, leaving Iruka alone with his detainees, his Kage and his Kage's personal ANBU guard hidden so well that Iruka couldn't even guess at where they were stationed.

"Partly, at least, Hokage-sama," Iruka replied, and ungently deposited his cargo on the floor.

Three quick (but careful) slices with a kunai had the rope falling down in chunks.

The children sat up and reoriented themselves, grumbling and rubbing their wrists and ankles. Iruka watched closely, but apparently none of them had suffered so much as an abrasion. Besides, bruises were instructional.

"So," spoke Hokage-sama, letting his gaze trail slowly over all three young troublemakers, "you started a rumour that I was dying, and Iruka-sensei would take over for me."

Udon-kun frowned.

"We said nothing 'bout you dying," protested Moegi-chan.

"'sides," added Udon-kun, "you already handed the Hat over once. We really said nothing about dying… Hokage-sama…"

Iruka felt some of his anger wash away. Death wasn't a joking matter, and he was glad the children knew it.

On the other hand, that didn't mean they were off the hook.

"You spread a rumour that Iruka-sensei would take over for me, despite knowing that it wasn't true?" inquired the Hokage.

The kids shrugged, almost in unison.

"Could be true," one of them muttered.

"Why on earth would you mock your teacher in such an uncouth way?" asked Hokage-sama, radiating disappointment.

"No, no, no! You don't get it!" Konohamaru-kun jumped up and stabbed his finger into the air in the direction of his honourable Grandfather. "Iruka-sensei is a hardcore dude made of awesome, and he's gonna tear you a new arsehole-"

"Konohamaru!" Iruka yelled. "Language!" Seeing the child cowed, he released the Big-Head illusion, spun on his heel and bowed deeply to Sandaime-sama, their leader and protector, the Professor, the God of Shinobi. "I am so, so very sorry, Hokage-sama!"

And he was. Very, _very_ sorry.

Sandaime-sama impassively watched the gradually reddening Iruka for an increasingly tense half a minute.

Then he threw his head back and laughed.

"See?!" Konohamaru-kun grumbled from where he and his two friends were huddled together, arms crossed, pouts set to maximum, "even Jiji thinks it was funny."

Hokage-sama wiped off his tears and, still chuckling, looked at the troublemakers. "I don't need to ask who put you up to this, do I."

"Nobody put us up to it!" exclaimed Konohamaru-kun.

"Yeah!" Moegi-chan agreed. "We volunteered!"

Udon-kun nodded. "It was a teamwork exercise, and we did well!"

Objectively speaking, Iruka had to admit, they did extremely well for a trio of eight-year-olds. Which, on the other hand, proved beyond any doubt that they had been guided by the hand of an older, more experienced prankster. One that knew not only how to infiltrate different places and disseminate information in them, but also how to motivate three children into going along with it – and how to couch it all as a gosh-darn 'teamwork exercise'.

"If only you were this eager to learn from Ebisu," sighed the Hokage, shaking his head.

"Ebisu's boring," summarily announced Konohamaru-kun. "Nii-chan teaches us useful stuff."

Iruka sighed again. "I'm going to hunt down Naruto and put a stop to this, Hokage-sama."

The Professor picked up his pipe and smiled. "Good luck to you, Iruka-kun. Please take these three with you, before I decide that they should be grounded, after all-"

"Hey!" the kids protested.

"We were totally training!"

"Yeah, you can't punish us for training!"

A single raised eyebrow from Hokage-sama made the rather compelling point that, yes, of course he could, and if they should try his patience any longer, he absolutely would.

They filed out of the office almost obediently.

Iruka was, as per usual in his dealings with Hokage-sama, impressed. Up until the moment he found himself standing alone in the street and watching the sunset colour the buildings orange and turn windows into brightly shining rectangles burning his retinas.

Now, where to find Naruto.

x

"Naruto…" Iruka growled darkly, stalking up to the boy at the edge of the forest.

"Heh… he-heh…" Naruto laughed sheepishly, rubbing the back of his head. "I didn't mean for it to go this far. But, hey, Iruka-sensei – can't deny it's a great prank!"

Iruka doubted it would be so funny once assassins came after him to prevent him from ever becoming the leader of Konoha – for which he was nowhere near strong enough, thanks oh so very much, Naruto.

But, he couldn't say that out loud. Because if it happened – and it might have legitimately happened, how _weird_ was Iruka's life? – then Naruto would never forgive himself. That was too much guilt for a boy who hadn't yet come to realise that unwise lies cost lives just the same as unwise revelations of the truth did.

"Do you even want to be Hokage?" Iruka asked, a little bewildered. Naruto wanted a lot of things, but most of them came down to people treating him – and each other – a little more kindly.

From what Iruka had seen at the Hokage Tower, there was very little kindness going around there. But, then, Naruto was close to the Hokage. Perhaps he mistook the Sarutobi-sama's personal affection for his professional demeanour?

It would make sense.

"Eh…" Naruto grinned and flapped his hand. "Ya-san says it's a reasonable retirement plan."

Iruka pressed his palm to his forehead.

"So," the boy continued with a shrug, "maybe, but like a looong way in the future. I meant it about the Hat, Iruka-sensei – you can take it for yourself in the meantime."

"Don't say that!" Iruka muttered, glancing around to make sure they weren't being eavesdropped on. He hoped that if there were ANBU in the trees, they would not take Naruto's prank seriously. "Sandaime-sama leads the village well-"

"Yeah, but he's _old_. He's gonna fall apart soon, and someone will have to take over-"

"-and that sort of contemplation may be pragmatic, Naruto, but it may also be treasonous, so please, _please_ , stop talking about it _now_."

Naruto looked at him like he thought Iruka was _slow_.

Iruka smacked the back of his head.

Naruto – kami damnit! – burst into a cloud of chakra.

Iruka had had it with this little brat.

x

Later that night, Iruka made a last stop at the Hokage's office before going home.

Sandaime-sama was still there, sitting behind his desk and looking terribly old and tired. Iruka nearly walked right out again – his problem was neither important nor time-sensitive – but then he was noticed and beckoned closer.

"I spoke with Naruto," Iruka reported, leaving out the fact that it was merely a Kage Bunshin, because in the end it did not matter. "He's… unrepentant."

Hokage-sama chuckled, then coughed, and reached for his glass. He sipped a bit of water, and then said: "If we punish him, it will just lend credence to his story. Someone might actually believe that he disclosed confidential information."

"Naruto wouldn't-"

"You and I know that, Iruka-kun," Hokage-sama interceded, "but in the eyes of others Naruto is simply an untried gennin, who very easily might turn out to be so biddable."

Iruka could see the dilemma there. He was also determined to ensure that Naruto would be taken to task for all the trouble he caused – but Iruka had his own wealth of prankster knowhow, which he could use to administer a punishment _discreetly_. "We'll let it go, then?"

Hokage-sama shrugged. "I have tasked a couple of specialists with spreading the true story – that it was all a tasteless prank. They were quite impressed with Naruto's efficiency. We may have to consider giving him infiltration training."

They might consider, Iruka thought bitterly, but they would never take Naruto off of a frontline assault squad. He was a jinchuuriki. Any other talents he might have had were, in the eyes of the village, immaterial.

"I don't think he should be rewarded for his misdemeanours," Iruka pointed out.

The lack of discipline Naruto had experienced as a child had not done him any favours. It was a wonder the boy had turned out as relatively well-adjusted as he was, even though he sometimes seemed as if he had been raised by wolves.

The Hokage smirked. "You have come a long way since the times of the chibi-sensei, Iruka-kun."

Oh kami. Iruka wished the ground would swallow him up, but going for an earth jutsu in the Hokage's office was not a good idea.

"Well, you're not a chibi anymore. Still a sensei, though." The Sandaime looked like he was having a lot of fun.

"Hokage-sama-"

"It is good to inspire your students' respect, my boy. I would hardly begrudge them their wish to see you succeed." His eyes stabbed straight through Iruka. "Even though, perhaps, this Hat needs to sit on a more… shall we say… jounin-savvy head."

Iruka stared at the floor tiles, embarrassed. He had been standing right here – perhaps two feet to the left – when Sandaime-sama told him how completely he had failed the jounin exam. It had been crushing then, and it still stung.

"You may, however, become an indispensable aide to a Hokage one day."

Iruka's head shot up, his eyes wide. He valiantly tried to forget that Sandaime-sama read _those books_ , too. And then he tried to not think about the passage from the book _someone_ had read to him out loud, which involved a newly appointed young Hokage, his coy aide and the table in the Hokage office _kami-damn-it_ why did Iruka have the poor taste to fall in love with someone like _that_?!


	7. Ready or Not

A/N 7: So, I was trying to figure out how this would go, and it's not fluffy. Sorry. An unintentional side-effect of Naruto being more competent and less dependent on his teammates is that he completely messes up the team dynamics. Instead of instantly regarding them as his precious people, Naruto dislikes Sasuke and Sakura, and keeps separate from them whenever he can. Moreover, his moments of competence trigger Sasuke's inferiority complex, and cause additional resentment. So, things might be better than in canon, but in a way they are also worse…

x

Chapter Seven: Ready or Not

x

"Sorry I'm late," said the jounin, appearing in a swirl of leaves. "There was a traffic jam at the corner of-"

"Is it true, Kakashi-sensei?!" Sakura screeched instead of the customary 'you're late'.

"Che," said the Lamppost.

Naruto glared from the bridge railing, where he was cringing and protectively holding his hands over his ears.

"I see you didn't do your homework, Sakura-chan," Kakashi-sensei remarked faux-pleasantly.

"S-sorry…" stammered the girl, and then killed the sentiment by glaring at the cringing Naruto, as if he was the cause of all her current problems.

He wasn't. Maybe _most_ of them, but he definitely didn't have anything to do with the weird pheromones Sasuke-teme was putting out that brainwashed girls into wanting to carry his babies. Naruto thought the whole pregnancy thing was _ew_ , and babysitting was about thousand times worse than cleaning ditches in the rain. The only exceptions were puppies, which even as smelly babies were floofy and yippy and the cutest things in Inari-sama's green world.

"Is it true," Sakura asked again, this time at a frequency that did not cause pain to either human or canine ears, "that Iruka-sensei is considered for the Godaime Hokage?"

The Lamppost leveled her a look which suggested that her parents maybe should not have insisted on keeping her after the lobotomy.

"No," Kakashi-sensei replied coolly, "that is not true. And before you ask, it's also not true that eating one spoon of detergent a day will prevent you from being haunted by ghosts, and nor is it true that the Yamanaka practice naked dancing in the light of the Full Moon, despite that one occasion with Inoru-chan on her twenty-first birthday. That was really just because of the alcohol."

"…what?" asked Sakura.

Naruto let his hands down, clasped them together, and bowed in respect for the quality of the deadpan delivery.

Sasuke watched them all as if all their parents should have chosen not to keep them. Naruto could have told him that his parents had actually _not kept him_ and it did not seem to have made a difference, but… why bother? The answer would have been either 'hn' or 'che' anyway.

"No, Sakura-chan," Kakashi-sensei translated. "That was really just a nasty, malicious rumour."

Naruto scowled. "How was it nasty and malicious?"

Kakashi looked at him with exaggerated surprise, as if he couldn't figure out why Naruto would ask that question, but Naruto wasn't ashamed of what he had done, and he definitely wouldn't play the innocence game with Dog, who would have probably beaten him with experience even while reading porn in public.

Because Dog was awesome like that.

"What better way to get rid of Iruka-sensei than to send all foreign spies and assassins after him?" Kakashi-sensei pointed out.

Naruto felt as if someone had ducked him into icy water.

What? No, that wasn't what he had done. Kakashi was just trying to scare him… surely…

"Anyway," said the jounin, "we've got a mission."

Naruto wanted to ask if it was Tora. He found he couldn't open his mouth. Nothing would happen to Iruka-sensei… right?

Naruto was an idiot. Iruka-sensei wasn't a civilian, but it worked the same for any precious person, didn't it? Hadn't Ya-san told him? The best way to protect someone is not to expose them to danger.

"We," said Dog, "are babysitting some of the youngest Akimichi children today. It will be good for you, Sakura. You need to weight-lift more."

x

Watching Naruto over the course of the day had been equal parts satisfying and painful. The boy had tied himself into knots with worry and guilt. In any case, Kakashi didn't regret laying out the potential consequences the way he had, because the lesson needed to be taught, and Iruka was too much of a soft-hearted pushover to do it.

This way it was a lesson learned cheaply. It did not cost anybody's life. Kakashi personally counted that as a success.

Come to think of it, watching his two other students over the course of the day had also been both satisfying and painful. He found no small joy in their suffering; he just wished that Sakura wouldn't have been successfully wrestled to the ground and squashed by a couple of toddlers… even if they were the size and weight of boulders.

Or that Sasuke wouldn't have stood there and watched her flail and beg for help without making a single move in her direction. Discovering this late in the game that the boy was capable of smiling came as a shock, too.

"Finally!" Kurenai snapped as he entered the Hokage office. "Now that Hatake- _sama_ has deigned to join us, can we get on with it?"

Chill, Kakashi thought in her direction. Asuma will keep. And if he doesn't, he should seek medical attention for that.

He didn't say it out loud, though, for a couple of reasons. One, that the Hokage already looked kind of irritated with him. Two, that he was cooler than that.

It was mostly the second reason, in fact.

What he said instead was: "Hatake Kakashi, nominating Team Seven for the Chuunin Exams."

He knew what was coming long before he had spoken those words. He hoped he was ready for it. He didn't even pretend that he wasn't worried.

"Hokage-sama!" shouted several voices, although one of them was noticeably louder and more enraged that the others.

Kakashi braced himself, standing at parade rest. His eye was trained somewhere over the Hokage's shoulder.

The Sandaime frowned. "Iruka-"

"With all due respect, Hokage-sama!" the chuunin exclaimed, forgetting propriety in his protective rage. "I know these children. They are _not_ ready!"

"Then they shouldn't have graduated," Kakashi pointed out harshly. He agreed with the vision of the Academy and with its charter, but any civilian school could churn out children that were _not ready_ for combat. For a ninja, attaining a rank one was not ready for meant death. "The question is, do we make them ready by throwing them into the Chuunin Exams, or by throwing them at nukenin?"

"Kakashi, you know they aren't ready?" Iruka demanded, holding onto his composure with tightly clenched fists.

Kakashi looked him in the eye. "No, they're not," he agreed. "But I'd still like one of them to pass."

"But-"

"I want this so-called team to be split apart as fast as possible," he explained. "If none of them advances or dies, I will make a formal request to the Hokage to disband Team Seven." That was highly irregular, and the precedents for it included shameful moments like rape and line theft. Kakashi didn't want it to come to that, but he wanted to have a dead gennin even less.

Clamour of protest rose from all sides.

The Hokage spoke over it: "Why?"

"They're all being held back," Kakashi admitted. He abhorred fucking up, but in this instance he honestly could not envision a workable solution. "Sasuke hasn't improved since graduation. Naruto – I am still not sure of his skill set. I don't know what he needs to be taught. And Sakura…"

Iruka watched him with wounded eyes. "We thought Sasuke's rejection would motivate Sakura to train-"

"It hasn't so far," Kakashi shot him down.

Kurenai took a half-step forwards and glared at all the men surrounding her. "Since when is encouraging delusions in a twelve-year-old girl a viable training tool?"

"You think entering them into the Chuunin Exams will help?" Asuma inquired.

"Or are you just trying to get rid of the responsibility?" demanded his unofficial girlfriend.

Kakashi looked at the two squad leaders whose teams consisted of healthy, happy clan heirs brought up in healthy, happy families (with the exception of the Hyuuga, but Hinata seemed like she somehow miraculously lacked the genetic stick up her butt). They had children willing to listen, willing to work together, and unlikely to kill one another due to rage or jealousy or just random psychotic break one day.

Kakashi grinned so widely that it could be seen even though his mask. "Kurenai, if you have a better idea, by all means."

"I could speak with the girl," she offered oh-so-magnanimously.

"Go ahead," Kakashi bade her, "if you think you'll be more successful than the seven people who tried, two of them certified psychologists and one a psychiatrist, go _right_ ahead."

That wasn't a cool thing to say, but he was tired, and he was pissed at himself. Plus, Iruka was probably pissed at him, too. This day sucked, but it had been bound to, because it was the culmination of six months of utter, concentrated _suck_ , with only Naruto's occasional bright moments to lighten it up.

Needless to say, Kakashi hadn't been enjoying his job lately.

"I will," Kurenai informed him stiffly, and then turned around to nominate her team of well-adjusted future clan heads, because apparently even at his worst, Kakashi was a trend-setter.

x

There was a knock on the door.

"Come in!" Iruka called out, stumped by who might be looking for him at this time. The only people who even knew that he stayed this late at the Academy in the days leading up to the graduation exams were people who wouldn't have bothered to knock.

Maybe the cleaners? No, it wasn't quite that late yet.

The door moved ajar.

Iruka squinted into the darkness behind it. "Naruto?" Since when did Naruto knock?

"I'm really sorry," Naruto mumbled.

Iruka scowled. He capped his pen and set down. This seemed serious; the marking would have to wait. "What did you do."

"I didn't mean to send foreign assassins after you!" yelled the boy, opening the door wide. "I swear I didn't-" The rest of the sentence was choked off, and Naruto began to cry in earnest.

Iruka stood, slowly, to make sure he didn't spook the boy. He was angry, yes – but mostly at Kakashi. He had been annoyed by the prank, and he had definitely wanted to alert Naruto to the possible dangers of information reaching enemies' ears, regardless of whether the information was true. But this – this was exactly what he had wanted to avoid.

"Hey," Iruka said gently, sinking to one knee in front of his favourite ex-student. "We all do some dumbass things sometime. The important thing is that you know better now, and you won't do it again."

Naruto jumped at him, pushing his tear and snot-streaked face into Iruka's shoulder. Oh, fine. Laundry day wasn't so far off, anyway.

"I'm s-sorry. You can't die! Please, don't die-"

"I'm not going to die," Iruka lied blatantly. It seemed to help. "Now, I've got a lot of work to do, but you can stay here if you can keep yourself occupied-"

"Actually!" Naruto stepped backwards, wiped his face into his sleeve (the long dark blue, which he wore under an orange t-shirt with a picture of the Sun in the front) and looked at Iruka with red-rimmed eyes. "I've gotta question."

Iruka glanced at the stack of tests waiting to be graded, and steeled himself. This was probably about the Chuunin Exams-

"How do you get a spare hitai-ate?"

"What would you need that for?" Iruka asked. "Naruto, every ninja has _one_ forehead protector, and you can only get another if it's damaged or lost." Since Naruto's was currently protecting his forehead, obviously neither of the cases applied.

"But Kakashi-sensei's ninken have them, and Pakkun-san told me that Kakashi got them for them."

Iruka looked into Naruto's blue eyes and wondered what on earth he was missing. This would take longer than a Chuunin Exams speech, he suspected.

A teacher's work was never done.

Iruka rose to his feet. "I need you to tell me everything."

The story came out haltingly, and in only the barest bones. Iruka managed to sort out 'Kana-san' in his head, and of course he had been acquainted with Pakkun for a while, but there were a lot of names for which he lacked context. At least the mystery of 'Ya-san' was solved – even if Iruka was still suspicious of this character, and demanded a meeting.

Naruto hedged. To absolutely no one's surprise.

Iruka decided to adjourn the debate until after graduation, so he could devote the requisite time to it, and took Naruto with him to get the forehead protectors instead of sending him to Kakashi, seeing as Kakashi had somehow dropped this ball. It was just faster than getting into an argument.

They would have stopped at Ichiraku's on their way, only the stand was already closed. Iruka bought each of them a pork-in-a-bun from a street vendor.

The Missions Desk was open round the clock, so Iruka confidently led Naruto in despite the late hour.

"Good evening, Koizumi-san," he said affably, even though he would have preferred it if someone else was on duty. "We need to register two ninken and requisition forehead protectors for them. Please gather the necessary forms for Naruto-kun."

"You'll help me fill it out, right?" Naruto asked under his breath, cowed by large amounts of paperwork.

"Of course-"

"Ninken?" asked Arakawa-san, coming in through the backdoor that connected this office to the Archives. "The…" he paused and reconsidered what he was going to say, "Uzumaki brat? Yeah, right."

"Iruka-san," said Koizumi, "don't take this personally, but there's really no reason to believe Uzumaki. Hitai-ate are property of the village, and quite valuable. We can't just give a few of them away."

"And Uzumaki's a known liar," Arakawa added.

Iruka wished he could protest, but after the stunt Naruto had pulled a few days ago, he really was rather well-known as a liar.

"Well," he said mildly, clasping Naruto's shoulder to prevent him from doing anything stupid, "if my word isn't enough in this case, I am sure Naruto-kun could demonstrate-"

"I can totally demonstrate, 'ttebayo!"

"Yeah, _right_ ," muttered Arakawa-san.

Iruka had had just about enough of this exchange. "In that case," he offered, "please provide us with the paperwork for registration of ninken, and we will file it tomorrow directly with the Hokage's office-"

"No, Iruka-san," said Arakawa. "I won't be party to defrauding the village, and devil only knows what the brat would do with spare forehead protectors. Maybe sneak in some Iwa ninja, because it would be _amusing_."

Iruka wondered what was the proper response to accusation of treachery, but he was a little too busy holding Naruto in place and keeping him from scratching anyone's eyes out to even attempt to react.

"I see," he said.

Koizumi shrank in his chair behind the desk, unwilling to side with anyone. Gutless. It was a wonder he even made chuunin, with that utter lack of spine.

"Wait here, Naruto," Iruka ordered, and went to get the papers himself.

Koizumi didn't even peep. Arakawa tried to get in Iruka's way, but a quick reminder of Iruka's authority to subject anyone to internal investigation solved that conflict. Iruka came back with a handful of papers to find his charge looking intently at the duty roster.

The look was familiar: the intent gaze of one who was planning a prank-like retribution, and had just discerned the identity of his victim.

Iruka smiled. "Come on, Naruto. We'll fill this out and you'll take them to Sandaime-sama tomorrow. You'll have the hitai-ate before the exam, I promise."

"I owe you ramen, Iruka-sensei," Naruto replied in lieu of 'thanks'.

x

"Muuum…" Sakura whined, trying to dodge her Mother's hands reaching for her hair. "Leave it be. I won't have time tomorrow to do anything with it." She was worried, she had to admit. The longest survival training they had done in Academy was two days, and Kakashi-sensei had told them to prepare for at least five.

Her hair wouldn't last that long – not even if she braided it. Her clothes would stink. And what about underwear? They couldn't really expect her to change in front of boys, right? It was _Naruto_! And… and… Sasuke-kun…

"Are you alright, dear?" her Mum asked worriedly. "You look flushed. Are you sure you don't have a fever?"

 _My only fever is love!_ bellowed the inner Sakura.

For love, Sakura promised herself, I will make it through. I'll even figure out the underwear, somehow. Maybe some sort of genjutsu to keep the boys from looking…?

x

" _Kuchiyose no Jutsu_!"

Rikku and Juuji appeared in the middle of Naruto's bedroom.

Naruto victoriously raised the two hitai-ate by the blue bandana attached to them.

"So, you finally managed to get them, Sunface," Juuji said dryly, but he nudged Naruto's thigh with his nose and demanded to be given one of the prizes. "I guess Pakkun did win the bet."

Naruto stuck out his tongue. He sat on his heels and tied the first hitai-ate around Rikku's neck as instructed. "You were right," he said to his first partner. "Iruka-sensei knew exactly what to do. And he wasn't too mad at me to help."

"You still don't know how a family works, do you?" Rikku grumbled.

Naruto shrugged and cheekily said: "I know there's a lot of betting going on in it."

"Aw, c'mon!" Juuji insisted, hopping up and down in place, rattling the walls. "Stop dragging it out. Gimme!"

x

Sasuke washed the dishes. He dried them and put them into the cabinet.

He wiped down the counter.

He tied up the plastic bag with trash and placed it by the door, to be taken out when he left in the morning. Then he sat at the table and practiced the seal sequences for the handful of fire jutsu he knew. When the clock struck eleven, he turned off the radio and then the lights.

He brushed his teeth, drank a cup of sake from his Uncle's vast stores and crawled into his bed.

"Good night," he said to the dark, empty house, and closed his eyes.

Outside the breeze moved the wind chimes hung above his Cousin's door. A shutter that had come loose slammed. Tree branches creaked; the water in the creek gurgled; dormice ran across the roof.

He heard footsteps. He knew he only imagined it; his Mother and Father had been ninja, he had never heard their footsteps. And _that man_ – _that man_ had always been as silent as a shadow.

Sasuke slept.


	8. Rrrip!

A/N: I did not mean to. My intentions for this were completely different. I didn't want an actual storyline here. And I was way too lazy to let it veer away from canon. I still think it's probably all Iruka's fault. Eh…

x

Chapter Eight: Rrrip!

x

The examination room had been full of new, weird and uncomfortable smells, but there had been nothing like this there.

Naruto tried not to stare. The hair on the back of his hands stood. If he had had hackles, they would have been raised. He didn't have a clue what in Inari's name this was – maybe some kind of test for the second phase of the exam? – but the way the half-naked Proctor reacted to it, it didn't seem familiar to her.

"I forgot!" Naruto exclaimed, and switched himself with a Kage Bunshin.

Sakura turned to the clone and started cussing him out, without even asking what he allegedly forgot. Sasuke moved a little further away from them and pretended that he didn't know them (and, huh, the weird smelly thing stared at him like one of his fangirls).

Naruto, hiding in a shadow by the wall and under a Henge making him look like an Inuzuka, bit his thumb, pressed his fist to the ground and whispered: " _Kuchiyose no Jutsu_."

Juuji appeared on the ground, almost entirely shielded by Naruto's body. In fact, it seemed that only a couple of people from the whole crowd noticed, probably alerted by the expulsion of chakra, while the rest were busy watching the spectacle of Team Seven.

"Tell me you didn't just call me for a good luck lick, bro," growled Juuji. "Mum will kill me. _Annai-twerp_ will kill me. They're already pissy that _you_ can't come-"

"You see that Grass person by the proctor-"

"Eurgh, now I regret I've ever eaten octopus. Sunface, people aren't meant to have tentacles sprouting out of their mouths-"

"That person wasn't in the first stage of the exams," Naruto explained. "And the proctor doesn't recognise them. And they smell weird."

"Pinch your nose?" suggested Juuji.

Naruto wasn't seeing the fun this time. That tongue-nin gave him the creeps, more so than the red-head from Sand or the lying four-eyes that smelled like snakes and freely shared information about Konoha ninja in front of teams from other villages.

Maybe Naruto wasn't ready to be chuunin, because the stuff happening around him made no sense to him. Maybe that was the real exam? Were they supposed to see underneath the underneath and point out that there were traitors and spies?

Okay, he could do that.

"I'm gonna give you a message for Kakashi-sensei. If you can't find him, bring it to…" He thought of Iruka-sensei, but Iruka-sensei had been too busy at the Academy lately, and to be honest after the last prank Naruto wasn't sure if a message like this would be believed. "If you can't find him, take it directly to the Old Man."

Juuji caught up with how serious Naruto was. His eyes narrowed, and he watched Naruto with all the graveness of a shinobi accepting orders from a superior officer. "Try to find Kakashi; if I can't get to him, get the Hokage. Alright, give me the deets, bro."

x

Less than an hour after they entered Training Ground 44, a battle broke out.

Naruto watched the columns of fire and flying trees and boulders with an open mouth, and thanked all that was canine for being far enough from that place. Shockingly, he and his teammates completely agreed on something: they stood on a sturdy branch of a tall tree and watched the horizon in mute awe.

"I… I…" Sakura said after a while of silence, "…I'm not really sure I'm ready to be chuunin." Her eyes reflected the red as an enormous ball of fire consumed the head of a gargantuan snake.

"Hn…" replied Sasuke, and for once it almost sounded like an agreement.

Naruto was pretty sure he had a handle on how much power was expected from a chuunin (having known and fought bastard Mizuki), and this was kind of more intense than the usual _jounin_ battle. "I don't think those guys are-"

The tree shook under them.

Sasuke hopped to the next tree, Sakura held on fast with chakra channeled to her palms, and Naruto let himself fall, forming the seals for Kage Bunshin. The clones materialised under him, slowing him down, and in popping gave him the memories of the situation on the ground.

A team from Rain took advantage of Team Seven's preoccupation and decided to attack. It was a good thing that Rain apparently didn't have a lot of big trees, or they might even have been somewhat effective about it.

In any case, they managed to explode part of the trunk, without realising that the canopy was way too thick to let the tree actually fall to the ground. Its branches locked with the other trees around, and it remained mostly upright.

Naruto hit the ground ready for a _Kuchiyose_.

"Goddamnit, 'maru, can't you do anything right?" yelled one of the masked ninja.

Two dogs appeared in front of Naruto; and instance later they and Naruto all sprang in different directions, dodging a hail of shuriken.

Naruto and Rikku tag-teamed the guy who was midway through a water jutsu, and while Naruto remained behind to activate a stun tag, Rikku jumped at the one with the tanto-

-who fell forwards before Rikku got to him, revealing Sasuke standing behind him with his kunai raised.

Sasuke nodded to both Rikku and Naruto, and then they all turned to the third Ame ninja.

Annai stood with her paws spread wide, head hung low, red-stained maw open and showing off rows of pointy teeth with blood still dripping off of them. A long, low growl came out of her throat, and even without glowing red eyes she looked demonic when she turned to Naruto.

The guy she had taken down was lying prone in front of her, already dead but still spilling out onto the undergrowth. She had ripped out the backs of his knees, then the inner side of his left elbow, and by the time he fell to the ground and realised that he only had one limb left, her teeth were inch-deep in his throat.

It had taken less than four seconds.

Naruto stashed away the handful of shuriken he had pulled out and squatted down to his friend. "Thanks, _imouto_. Wasn't expecting you, though. Everything alright over there?"

Annai let out several long, smelly breaths and then scrunched up her nose. "I am a full-fledged ninken now, _nii-chan_! I can help you just as well as my stupid, stinky brother can!"

Naruto grinned. She didn't use to think Juuji was stupid or stinky. In fact, she used to idolise him in girly and cute ways. "Your Mum will kill me."

"She won't!" Annai refuted with certainty Naruto equally envied and disbelieved. "She _won't_! I had my Presentation and everything. I mean, I _just_ had it. You sorta summoned me from the arena. But I can do it! I _can_. I just…" She looked down and idly pawed at the ground. Suddenly, instead of a bloodthirsty hellhound, there was a young canine _kunoichi_ who had just grown out of puppyhood and wasn't yet used to her new status. "You want me to fight with you, right? You do, right, _nii-chan_?"

Naruto suppressed a gasp. _That_ was what worried her? Ridiculous! As if he ever turned any of his precious people away!

"Ne, ne, Annai-chan! We're Pack! Of course we'll fight together. Believe it!"

Annai beamed up at him, doggy grin wide, eyes bright. She put out her paw.

Naruto shook it.

He barely even noticed Sasuke watching them, quiet and not so much judgmental as thoughtful.

Then Sakura finally made her way to the ground, opened her mouth – noticed Sasuke glaring at her – and shut it again. She went to look through the downed Rain ninja's clothes to find their scroll.

x

Konoha was quiet, although Iruka very much doubted it was actually asleep. Today's events have shaken everybody.

The Hokage Tower had been mostly deserted, with the exception of the staff at the Missions Desk and the only officially named Contender present in the village at the moment, who was facing a night full of frantic scrambling. The Hokage was at the hospital; the Kazekage was dead; the Otokage was close to death – and Iruka dearly wished he could make that bastard really, completely dead as a kami-damned doornail.

He knocked on the open wing of the door, quietly, but in the silence of the night the sound echoed.

Then he dragged himself into the room. Ignoring the ANBU, he crossed over to the desk. He considered his options. Some things mattered more, some less. And in light of the circumstances… keeping a secret for the sake of it seemed like such a petty thing to do.

He carefully pushed a pile of paperwork to the side and took a seat in the freed spot on top of the desk.

"How is he?" Kakashi asked from the Hokage's chair, eyes trained on yet another report. Both eyes. He was cramming, trying to read and retain all the information available on the situation, so he would be able to figure out what now.

It wasn't looking good.

Iruka set his feet up on the armrest by Kakashi's right elbow. "Yakushi-san said he'll live."

Kakashi understood the implications. He nodded to himself, put the report away and took another one. "He's been pressured to select a successor before."

Iruka recalled Sandaime-sama's pale papery face, his sunken eyes, and the look of utter defeat on his face. The Hokage might have won the fight today, with the aid of a couple of elite ANBU teams _and_ the whole contingent of the jounin sensei and the exam proctors, but something in him had been irreparably broken.

"It's not about the pressure. He can't – he can't do it anymore." That chafed far more than the damn body armour.

Kakashi looked up at him. Iruka stared back, trying to convey the hopelessness of the situation.

Kakashi nodded. "I've sent Pakkun with a missive to Jiraiya."

Iruka took a deep breath. "You could-"

"No," Kakashi refused resolutely.

Iruka accepted that. Besides, the Hokage's desk wasn't nearly as comfortable as Jiraiya-sama's novel had implied, so it wouldn't be that much of a loss.

x

When they finally reached the tower at the centre of the Training Ground 44 and opened their scrolls, the Iruka-sensei that appeared was much different from the Iruka-sensei Naruto remembered.

His eyes were red-rimmed; there were lines around his mouth that hadn't been there before, and instead of a chuunin vest he was wearing body armour.

"W-what happened?!" Naruto blurted. "Are you okay, Iruka-sensei?! Did the foreign assassins come after you-?"

Iruka-sensei bopped Naruto on the head to shut him up, but made sure to do it very gently. Naruto barely even felt it.

"Things have been happening for the past couple of days. You will find out soon enough. Naruto, you will have to debrief with Ibiki-san – some of the information you have sent with Juuji-kun has been very important. The Acting Hokage has awarded you B-rank mission payment for it."

"To that idiot?!" Sakura screeched.

Sasuke didn't say anything. He watched closely, though.

"Me?" Naruto's mouth opened. "B-but, I didn't do anything-"

Iruka-sensei laughed, more bitter than Naruto had ever heard him sound. "Let's just say you saved lives, okay? Now, first things first. Team Seven, do you know the meaning of these words?" He pointed at the inscription on the wall.

Naruto gaped. Who cared about a stupid poem? What did it mean 'Acting Hokage'?

"Where's Jiji?!"

"It's a koan," grumbled Sasuke.

"Um, right," Sakura agreed, nervously looking at her idol, as if asking for approval to speak. "It's the Sandaime Hokage's motto for the chuunin-"

" _Where is Jiji_?!" Naruto yelled.

Iruka-sensei, Sakura and Sasuke stared at him.

He didn't care. He wanted to know why there was an 'Acting Hokage', and why there had been a huge battle yesterday, and why Iruka-sensei hadn't slept since Naruto had last seen him. The only thing he could think of was too terrible.

"Naruto…" Iruka-sensei sighed. "Sandaime-sama has been hurt. He will recover, but in the meantime things are a little tough. I am only telling you this because I know I can trust you – all of you. This is confidential information. Do not tell _anyone_. Do you understand me?"

"Un," Sasuke said.

"Yes, of course, sensei," Sakura agreed.

"I want to see him!" Naruto demanded.

"After the second exam is over. And after your debriefing with Ibiki-san." Iruka-sensei hesitated, and then sank onto one knee in front of Naruto, almost the same way he had done a few days ago at the Academy. He pulled Naruto into his arms and hugged him so hard it almost hurt. "I'm so proud of you, Naruto."

Then he stood, rubbed the bridge of his nose and waved his hand. "Go on in. Be good. I'm already late." He opened the massive Tower doors for them and disappeared in a swirl of leaves.

x

They were given a room to stay in, but neither one of them wanted to spend more time around the others than strictly necessary, so they migrated to the common areas. There was a mess hall; the food seemed pretty okay, and it was free, so Naruto went for seconds and then for thirds.

He didn't mind eating alone. He minded not being allowed to see Jiji, so he tried to distract himself with watching the other guys who had made it through so far.

"Ino-pig?" Sakura exclaimed at another table. "How did _you_ get here?"

The blonde kunoichi put her hand on her hip and stuck her nose in the air. "I don't have to ask about you, Forehead. Obviously, Sasuke-kun carried both you and stupid Naruto like so much useless baggage!"

"I'm not useless!" protested Sakura. "And Naruto isn't useless either…"

Naruto gaped at the back of her head. Where had _that_ come from? Was someone impersonating her?

"That's a change of tune," Ino remarked, and then shrugged. "It's not like it was too hard if you knew who to go after. Shikamaru figured it out during the written exam, so we had an easier go of it."

"Eh? The laze-about?"

Ino gave Sakura a look that was almost pitying. "Look, Shikamaru may be lazy and annoying, but he's the smartest guy our age I know."

"Ehh?!" Sakura's face went red and she drew herself taller. She raised a fist. "How can you say that?! He's barely better than Naruto! Sasuke-"

"Is unquestionably the coolest and strongest and best looking," Ino cut her off. "And he'll be mine soon enough. I thought being on his team would be an unfair advantage for you, but it looks like all you managed to do was disgust him with your uselessness. Thanks for freeing the way for me, Forehead."

"Sasuke-kun is a genius!" Sakura screeched – making Naruto flinch – too enraged by the slight to her one true stud to even notice that Ino had kind of stomped all over her there.

Ino rolled her eyes. "Yeah, he is. He's got skills way ahead of his age group. But he's not a genius the way Shikamaru is. In pure intelligence. It's a difference, Forehead, and you should probably figure it out before your ignorance gets somebody killed." With a superior look she flounced toward the counter to get some grub.

Sakura twisted in the chair to glare at her back with palpable KI – Naruto was kind of impressed. He was also a little impressed by the slew of curses that she mouthed, even though she didn't say any of them out loud.

He hadn't known she knew those words.

To Naruto it was unquestionable that Shikamaru was smarter than Sasuke (the fact that some cats – Tora, notably – were smarter than Sasuke notwithstanding), because Shikamaru had at least figured out a way to live his life that didn't make him deeply unhappy all the time. Also, that meant he wasn't trying to share the unhappiness with everyone around. He knew how to smile, and even laugh. He wasn't forever on edge, and he preferred to relax rather than hating his teammates for 'holding him back'.

Maybe, Naruto figured out, they were both geniuses. He didn't know, and he really didn't think that being a genius had ever made anyone happy. Shikamaru was _so_ smart, that he tried to make himself less smart, so he could be happier. That was very, very smart.

Naruto shook his head to untangle himself from the increasingly knotty yarn of thought.

"That's rubbish," Sakura grumbled, looking to the other end of the hall, where Sasuke was actually – wait for it – dramatically brooding alone in a shadowed corner while watching his potential opponents. "If not for stupid Naruto, Shikamaru would have been the dead last."

Ah, there went the insult. So it was really Sakura, and not an impersonator.

And she was right about Shika's marks being _barely_ better than Naruto's, but that was because Shikamaru knew _exactly_ , down to the last point, how much work he needed to do to pass, and didn't bother with any more. That was the difference between trying to be the best you could, and trying to be good enough.

The best didn't always mean the strongest. And the strongest didn't mean good enough.

But Sasuke didn't realise this. Shikamaru did.

Naruto opened his mouth to try and explain this to Sakura, even though he was pretty sure that she wouldn't get any of it, and she would try to hit him again simply for saying anything negative about the tangle of issues she was in love with-

But Sakura wasn't there anymore.

Naruto contemplated the next course of action, then shrugged and decided to leave it be. Honestly, who cared?

It wouldn't miraculously make Jiji better.

He went for fourths.

x

Kakashi's Kage Bunshin sitting in the audience of the preliminary fights raised an eyebrow at the match-up. Was he supposed to believe that _this_ was a coincidence?

In all his 'cramming' – as Iruka called it – he hadn't gotten up to all the manipulations behind the chuunin exams yet, but this was just too obvious. As if the Hokage's favouritism hadn't been blatant enough before… although he had to admit that it made a lot of sense.

To avoid splitting up Team Seven based on terminal incompatibility (or killing off a member), one of them would have to become chuunin. Sakura was already out and, while Sasuke could beat most of the candidates in a straight-up fight, he wasn't likely to impress all that much in the third stage of the exam.

Kakashi could freely admit that of his three students, Naruto was the one most likely to measure up.

The Inuzuka had potential, too, but the most advanced candidate from Kurenai's team was clearly the Aburame boy, so Inuzuka's defeat wouldn't be a great loss.

And keeping it _in the family_ , so to speak, ensured that even in the worst case neither of the boys would die.

x

Meanwhile, down in the arena, Kiba cracked his knuckles and grinned from ear to ear. "We've got this in the bag, Akamaru! Naruto's the dead last – we'll beat him into the dust!"

"Huh, Kiba and Akamaru…" Naruto hummed. On one hand, he could theoretically keep his summoning a surprise for the next round…

Nah. This was too good an opportunity to pass up.

"Begin!" the Proctor ordered.

Kiba ran forward.

Naruto bit his thumb, folded his fingers into the signs of boar, dog, bird, monkey and ram in quick succession, practiced enough at them that he could have performed the sequence in his sleep.

Faced with an unfamiliar jutsu, Kiba tried to brake. His momentum carried him forward while Akamaru jumped to catch up.

Naruto slammed his palm into the ground.

There was a puff of chakra smoke, and then Rikku stood next to half-kneeling Naruto, both looking in the direction of their momentarily bemused opponents.

"I'll take the puppy," Naruto suggested.

Rikku barked in agreement. "Then I'll take the ninken."

Kiba's face scrunched up in response to the offense. He opened his mouth to complain-

(Aka-chan behind him flopped onto his back, stuck all four paws in the air and played dead.)

-and that was pretty much how Naruto won his preliminary fight.

x

Naruto decided that Ibiki was cool, even if he made Naruto repeat the whole story three times and asked a lot of weird questions that didn't make any sense – what did it matter if Naruto recognised the second exam proctor as one of the ANBU that used to guard him? His nose was just that good!

Mainly, Naruto decided that Ibiki was cool because after their talk was over, Ibiki took him to the hospital to see the Old Man.

"Don't tire him out, Uzumaki," growled the scarred man. "He needs all his energy to heal."

Naruto solemnly nodded.

He felt heavy going inside the hospital room. Everything stank like medicine and disinfection, except Old Man Hokage, who stank like tobacco and illness and sweat and blood and fried bacon. There had been a lot of fire techniques used in the battle. Apparently, even a ninja as awesome as the Sandaime could get singed.

"Hey, Jiji," Naruto said quietly.

The Old Man's eyes opened a sliver. He smiled at Naruto and moved his hand.

Naruto took that as an invitation to grab his wrist, even if it scared him how slow and weak and – as Ibiki said – tired the old guy was. "You gotta get better, yeah?"

"Naruto…" Jiji rasped. "Good… job." Then his eyes closed at he fell asleep.

Naruto checked that he was breathing – he _was_ – and then backed out of the room. He didn't even care that Ibiki saw him wiping his eyes.

Ibiki didn't say anything.

Ibiki was cool.

x

Watching Annai with a Konoha hitai-ate sit proudly by Naruto's side made Kana feel nostalgic.

It wasn't that long ago when they were both tiny, helpless, and looking to her for guidance. They still occasionally sought her advice, thank Inari, but there they went, striking out on their own in the wide, merciless world.

 _Boom_!

The ground shook. The Hokage Tower disappeared inside a cloud of dark grey smoke, and a single colourful blur shot out of the window and over the roofs.

Naruto immediately pursued, Annai and Juuji on his heels, and Kana leapt to follow them as soon as she realised that Ya was already on his way, too. So much for a family meal. She had hoped they could celebrate Annai's Presentation together, since Naruto couldn't attend it…

When Kana finally landed in the training ground which the saboteur chose as the site of confrontation, Juuji, Annai and Naruto were tag-teaming the ninja, who stood in place and repeatedly slapped his three attackers out of the air. Kana was ready to attack, but Ya stopped her.

"Look how gentle he is," he pointed out quietly and grinned.

Kana looked. And, truly, the older ninja seemed to be having fun, but also making sure that he didn't hit either of the youngsters harder than they could take. Overall the effect was that of a light spar.

"Jiraiya-sama," said an ANBU, stepping out of the trees. "There's no need for-"

"That brat tried to trick me into taking that damn Hat!" griped the stranger, who was apparently one of the Legendary Sannin. "He's lucky I didn't blow up the whole place!"

"Didn't you?" Naruto inquired, pausing in a crouch. "'cause it sure looked like you did."

"Smoke tag, kid," explained Jiraiya-san. "I usually put a little more juice into my own. And you-" He jabbed a forefinger at the tree line. "- _you_ should be glad I've got a sense of humour. Damn brat! I knew you were trouble the second Sensei told me about you. But trying to con me into becoming the Godaime is taking it a step too far!"

"It was worth the try," replied Iruka, who appeared in the meadow closely followed by Kakashi – as if Naruto's two teachers were in some weird collusion.

"Iruka-sensei?" Naruto inquired, bemused. " _Kakashi_ -sensei?"

Kana looked at Ya.

Ya looked back and shrugged. This called for a Council. And this time neither Pakkun nor Rikku would get out of it.

"Look," Jiraiya said with a sigh, letting his hands down once he was sure that neither Juuji nor Annai would leap at him again, "I get where you boys are coming from. And I know too well what's at stake. But, correct me if I'm wrong – can't we solve at least three of our problems with one move?"

"Saa…" Kakashi scratched his head, and then shrugged. "I'm game, if you think you can convince her…?"

"Wait," Naruto said, "what problems?"

Kana honestly didn't expect any of the older ninja to answer the question, even with four ninken surrounding Naruto-kun and baring their teeth.

"We need a Hokage," explained Iruka (shocking Kana with the candidness) and swiftly continued upon noticing the horror on Naruto's face. "Sarutobi-sama _will_ heal, but – you said it yourself, Naruto. He is very old. And difficult times are coming. We thought Jiraiya-sama might take over-"

"No, you didn't," grumbled the Sannin, "or you wouldn't have tried to _trick_ me."

"-but apparently he has other obligations."

"That's still only _one_ problem," Annai-chan pointed out suspiciously.

"Maa," Kakashi deliberated, "the others are a little bit confidential."

"Is this all about Jiji?" demanded Naruto.

Iruka sighed and, ignoring Kakashi's pointed look, nodded. "He's not healing as well as his iryounin would like."

"And," Juuji cut in, "I think they still didn't manage to kill the catturd with the tentacle tongue."

Kana was absolutely stumped by what just came out of her son's mouth. Ya only shrugged at her again – but Annai seemed like she knew what her brother was talking about, and so did Naruto.

It felt like she was losing them. They were all so grown up…

"Easy-peasy!" announced Jiraiya-san with a wide, sharp grin. "We'll just have to get Tsunade-hime to come back! And since that's going to take some _really_ good tricking, I know just whom you should entrust with this task, Acting Hokage!"

Everyone in the training ground looked at Iruka.

Iruka froze.

Naruto nodded decisively. "No worries, Iruka-sensei! Just request me as support, and we'll trick the heck out of this person." He cracked his knuckles. "Let's get pranking, 'ttebayo!"

x

x

End note: Yes, that is all in Shinobi's Best Friends. However, TYN-verse does not end here. Sooner or later, another story will pop up.

Yes, there will be a Dog-sensei moment.

See ya,

Brynn


	9. Sequel!

Hi everyone!

Just a quick shout out: I posted a sequel to _Trust Your Nose_ and Shinobi's Best Friends. Because of reasons, I am only posting this on AO3. I'd give you a link, but ffnet hates links and eats them.

My nick on AO3 is _BC_Brynn_ , the story is called _Old Dog's Tricks_ , and it's linked in a series called _Trust Your Nose_ , because that's a thing AO3 lets you do. I hope to see you there.

Cheers!

Brynn


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